My understanding was that as automation eats jobs people will need money to live whilst they pursue self-actualisation, creative living and community-based work

My understanding was that as automation eats jobs people will need money to live whilst they pursue self-actualisation, creative living and community-based work/contributions (in place of "finding a job"). If the reporting is correct in that the aim was to see how people would respond given the current state of affairs - get a haircut, get a job - then maybe the aim was misguided? Better mental-health, for example, and contributions to common/public good (freed from the scourge of having a job and job-seeking obligations) might be what matter most as the jobs people tend to do are replaced with jobs that they can't yet do. During that transition period of creative destruction what you really don't want is civil unrest (or opioid abuse), right? Perhaps this should have formed a greater part the metric. Of course, how you go about raising taxes in this new world might prove an even more thorny question which relegates the former to "continuing research".