NYC Program Tries to Motivate Patients With Cash

That said, Dr. Racine expressed full support for the aspects of the program that encourage preventive care. “The principle of actually using cash incentives to get people to do things is great. It's sort of the opposite of taxing. You tax things that you don't want people to do, and this is sort of an inverse tax,” he said.

Currently, 5,100 families are being recruited via the schools' free-lunch program in six city neighborhoods in which the poverty rates exceed 40%. Candidates must have children in the fourth, seventh, or ninth grades and must be documented legal residents or U.S. citizens.

An equal number of families (2,550) will be randomly assigned to a study group and to a control group in order to study the program's efficacy, Ms. Gibbs explained.

Because many low-income families do not have bank accounts, the mayor's office recruited four banks and four credit unions to provide free checking accounts for program participants.

'It's sort of the opposite of taxing. You tax things that you don't want people to do, and this is sort of an inverse tax.' DR. RACINE