Brent Toderash

Born and raised in Dauphin, MB Canada, a town then just shy of 10,000 people; fewer now. In the 1970s, it was selected for the provincial government's Mincome experiment to to provide residents with a universal basic income, and the results were positive well beyond reasonable expectations. I spent a good deal of time on rural gravel roads, driving possibly too fast through my teen years. I still miss riding horseback and don't get enough time on motorcycles, but left there in 1986 for the Winnipeg area.

Completed an undergrad degree in 1989, got married, and began some grad work. I Enjoyed academic research and writing, and had a knack for it but went a different way career-wise. There's not a lot of money in being a career scholar. I still enjoy writing, but don't do enough of it. Published on dead trees, but have also written extensively through more than one multi-year daily-posting routine on two blogs, plus a few more casual ones alongside those niches. Material from one of those blogs was cited in an accessible scholarly work as well as in a book by some well-known marketing personalities.

Twice now, I've spent almost three months living abroad and travelling around the region: once in Hong Kong in 1987, and once in Italy in 2023. These have been some of the best experiences of my life, proving to me that while you can see a lot of sights, you can't know an area through a whirlwind visit for a week or two. I'm still planted in Winnipeg, where my wife and I have raised two daughters, both adults now. We have two dogs which help keep life interesting.

For more about the mincome program, see Manitoba’s Mincome experiment (CMHR), Canada’s forgotten universal basic income experiment (BBC), and Evelyn Forget, The Town with No Poverty.