Ownership & Assets

Today is a big day for the asset building community. Our friends at CFED have released their newly updated 2013 Assets and Opportunity Scorecard which evaluates household financial security across the U.S. and grades states on how well or poorly they support asset development and promote opportunity. 

As has been true in recent years, the key finding is that huge swaths of the population are living in a precarious state of "asset poverty." As our Justin King told the Huffington Post: “These are households and individuals that are living paycheck-to-paycheck. And without savings, you’re one misstep away from financial disaster.”

New America's Education Policy Program has a new report out today that presents a comprehensive package of reforms to the existing federal student aid system for higher education. The Education team makes a compelling case for the need for reform:

In short, the present federal financial aid system is no lon­ger up to the demands of the times. It was built in a differ­ent era and has evolved haphazardly over the decades, in response to fiscal exigency and interest group pressures. It has become unwieldy, inefficient, and overly complicated, in a way that wastes taxpayer dollars and fails to provide institutions and students with the resources and incentives they need to complete high-quality college degrees....Taxpayers and students need an aid system that is simpler, more understandable, more effective, and fairer.

In particular, they propose reforms that dramatically strengthen the Pell Grant program, simplify the federal student loan program, eliminate education tax breaks which currently favor higher-income families, boost programs that support disadvantaged middle and high school students, and make institutions of higher education more accountable to both students and taxpayers.

We were pleased to host an event on January 25th with the Washington Monthly to commemorate the release of their January/February issue which focuses on race throughout American history and particularly in light of Obama’s second term. Paul Glastris, the panel’s moderator and the editor-in-chief of the Washington Monthly, explained the purpose of the event as breaking the “politically-imposed code of silence” on talking about race in the Obama administration. Few in the administration or even in the wider public are willing to speak openly about race in America, a fact which this event and the accompanying Washington Monthly issue seek to address.

The Asset Building News Week is a weekly Friday feature on The Ladder, the Asset Building Program blog, designed to help readers keep up with news and developments in the asset building field. This week's topics include inequality, the safety net, and self-sufficiency.

We're pleased to be hosting an event tomorrow morning with the Washington Monthly here at New America. We have a great panel assembled to look at a range of themes around racial inequality, both now at the start of Obama's second presidential term and throughout American history. Many of the articles from the latest edition of the Washington Monthly (available here) grapple with the historical and contemporary roots of this inequality and will help drive the conversation.

Editor's Note: This blog post was authored by Bob Annibale, Global Director of Citi Community Development and Microfinance. 

Earlier this week, President Obama was sworn in for a second term, and his inaugural address drove home the notion that “prosperity must rest upon the broad shoulders of a rising middle class.” Yet the U.S. Census Bureau reports that in 2011, 46.2 million people — or nearly one in six Americans —lived below the official poverty line of $23,201 a year for a family of four. Millions more households live just above this level, and even more lack almost any savings. Prosperity, however, will only really be achieved when it is a shared and inclusive prosperity, recognizing the contributions made by all communities.

Income inequality has been widening over the last 40 years, but new analysis of the U.S. Census Supplemental Poverty Measure by the Brookings Institution provides some hope. It underscores the idea that two tax credits for working families — the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and its companion Child Tax Credit (CTC) — have been crucial tools for many low- and moderate-income families to raise their standards of living, build assets and educate their children.

Two reports released last week take a look at the issue of access to credit and preserving homeownership as a cornerstone of asset building in the wake of the recession. The foreclosure crisis had a particularly devastating impact on low-income families and communities of color, resulting in a significant widening of the racial wealth gap. These new reports seek to outline some key considerations for ensuring that homeownership remains a feasible goal for all families—and in particular for those that were hit hardest by the housing collapse.

Editor’s Note:This post was authored by Josh Freedman, a policy analyst with New America’s Economic Growth Program. This post originally appeared on New America’s In the Tank blog.

The Great Recession and its aftermath have put an additional strain on the American social contract, as more Americans needed to draw from revenue-strapped government supports. Even while growth returns slowly, the lingering effects include shifts in public attitudes, particularly toward programs to aid the poor. Yet public support for social insurance programs like Social Security and Medicare remains very high.

With tax filing time just around the corner, this Friday is National EITC Awareness Day. In an effort to raise awareness, particularly among Members of Congress and their staff of this important tax credit, we're pleased to be co-sponsoring a briefing on Capitol Hill this Thursday along with the National Community Tax Coalition and a robust cohort of partner organizations. RSVP and event details are here.

The Asset Building News Week is a weekly Friday feature on The Ladder, the Asset Building Program blog, designed to help readers keep up with news and developments in the asset building field. This week's topics include jobs, retirement, debt, housing, and taxation related issues.