Insight CCED Home Image rotator Choose a Insight Center  

Search 
Helping People and Communities Become, and Remain, Economically Secure

Insight Home >> Program Work >> Savings and Asset Building Print this page

Savings and Asset Building

The goal of the Insight Center's Savings and Asset Building program is to promote programs and policies that help close the gap in assets or wealth—between rich and poor communities, women and men, people of color and white people, recent immigrants and residents from birth.

In order for people to achieve long-term economic security, they need assets. An individual economic asset includes things like a savings account, a home, a small business, or even a car. Community economic assets include things like a vibrant downtown, the presence of financial institutions, affordable housing, land trusts, and development agreements that benefit the people who live in the community.  Assets influence individual and community economic well-being, opportunity for future gain, the capacity to withstand hardship, and the transfer of wealth between generations.

Key Projects and Initiatives

  • Convenings, a grant program, and a clearinghouse that bring together experts of color and help expand the impact of their work
  • Closing the Racial Wealth Gap. Working to change the system so that the 85 percent gap in wealth between people of color and white people in the United States decreases dramatically.
  • Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprise. Conducting research to support minority- and women-owned business enterprise development.
  • Community Asset Building. Researching and advising nonprofit economic- development corporations on social-enterprise creation and replication strategies.
  • Expanding IDAs. Conducting research and convening a learning community to explore increasing matched-savings accounts for low-income individuals, known as Individual Development Accounts (IDAs).
  • Access to Financial Services and Products. Increasing access to financial services and products that are safe, affordable, and culturally appropriate.

    Click here for more projects.


Customized Services

  • Strategically plan and manage initiatives for foundations
  • Research community and family savings and asset building strategies, including feasibility, scalability, case studies, and best practices.
  • Consult on the start-up or replication of worker-owner cooperatives, especially in new immigrant communities
  • Research sector-based investment and support strategies for minority- and women-owned business and small-business development
  • Design small-business development policy and programs, including affirmative marketing and procurement, and financing for minority- and women-owned businesses
  • Consult on alternative financial products, such as payday lending

  • Advise community-development corporations and other organizations to build their capacity, legal infrastructure, and strategic plans

 

Home | Donate | Contact | Site Map |  Jobs & Internships

© 2007, 2008 Insight Center for Community Economic Development. Privacy and Terms of Use