Advancing Economic Justice Today Part I: Resilience in Trying Times
By Andrea Levere
Editor’s note: This post has been adapted from a speech on the state of the asset-building field delivered at the 2018 Prosperity Summit by Andrea Levere, President of Prosperity Now. This is the first of a two-part series, “Advancing Economic Justice Today”. This post takes stock of the challenges and victories the
asset-building field has experienced over the last two years. Part two examines the current state and future of the asset-build movement.
It feels as if justice and opportunity are eroding every day. Out of the long list of disturbing events and actions that have occurred since the election, three stand out as they relate to creating economic opportunity for low- and middle-income people in America:
1. The loss of major federal programs that facilitate or match the savings of low-income people.
2. The passage of a regressive tax law that is increasing inequality even more than the upside-down tax code it replaced.
3. The hollowing out of one of the greatest legislative accomplishments of the past decade, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, leaving consumers and students without an advocate in a rapidly changing financial marketplace.
Despite these events — and so many more — I was recently inspired by this quote:
“Adversity doesn’t build character. It reveals it.”
I thought of all the people in our field who have collectively demonstrated character in the face of adversity by advancing justice and opportunity in ways that are making a huge difference for those we care about.
I see this in five trends:
1. The Prosperity Now Community is mobilized and gathering strength and members every day.
Our Community is nearly 25,000 members strong, and our seven networks have grown from 4,000 to 11,000 members over the past year. We are led by 77 Community Champions in 42 states who convene, educate and advocate for change.
The Community has led the way to rare political victories. This year, VITA is poised for a potential $5 million increase to $20 million and to become permanent for the first time in over 40 years. The Refund to Rainy Day Savings Act was reintroduced by a group of four bipartisan Senators. And we will soon see the introduction of the first Baby Bonds bill in the Senate! (Update: It has since been introduced.) In the meantime, members of the Campaign for Every Kid’s Future will open 700,000 CSAs by 2019 on their way to a goal of over a million by 2020.
2. We Are Practicing the Rule: “Nothing About Us Without Us.”
Our market research, product and service design and delivery methods are increasingly driven by the experiences and insights of those we serve. People have diverse and complex financial lives, and our solutions will work only if they match their truth. Prosperity Now has released the Financial Coaching Program Design Guide to help you create or refine a financial coaching program that is participant-centered, participant-driven and grounded in inclusive and equitable principles. The Guide’s lessons were gathered through surveys, interviews and beta-testing with hundreds of practitioners and customers.
3. The Field’s Commitment to Bridging the Racial and Gender Wealth Divides Is Transforming Our Program and Policy Agendas.
The racial and gender wealth divides are the products of centuries of policies and practices that keep people of color and women from getting ahead. Our deepening understanding of the institutional and structural barriers that created them guides how we craft policies and programs to bridge these divides. Research underscores the value of John Powell’s standard of targeted universalism: We must design policies that allocate benefits directly to those most affected by these profound inequities.
4. Financial Well-Being Is Driving a New Theory of Business.
One of my first steps after the election was to sit down with our private sector partners to explore how they could play a leadership role in filling the gaps left by the federal government. The response has exceeded my expectations. Many of our corporate partners have adopted or are expanding a commitment to financial wellness as a core business strategy. We have a long way to go, but we can point to partnerships built on the knowledge that more inclusive economic growth is good for everyone.
5. Finally, We Ask: Whose Bad Choices?
Changing the stories that we tell about why people are poor is just as important as changing the policies that are responsible. Our field is working at every level to broadcast a new narrative that puts the blame where it belongs: the structure, not the striver. This year’s Prosperity Now Scorecard report declared: “The dominant narrative about low-wealth people is nothing but a series of myths.”
No one is more articulate on this point than Prosperity Now Founder Bob Friedman, who captured the fundamental truth that low-income people have more capacity than opportunity in his new book “A Few Thousand Dollars.” We now all have a playbook for narrative change!
The current state and future of the asset-building movement is explored in the second part of this series, “A Roadmap for the Future.”
