Strategies and Models

Community development financial institutions (CDFIs) include a variety of financial institutions with a community development mission, all of which provide credit, technical assistance, and other financing services that help low-income individuals, community development corporations, and other community-based entities pursue and implement effective community wealth-building strategies.

Cooperatives are an established community wealth-building strategy that can be found in many economic sectors, including banking (credit unions), agriculture, electricity generation and transmission, telecommunications, housing, and child care. In every case, cooperatives operate on the basis of the core democratic principle of "one person, one vote." The top 100 U.S. co-ops alone have more than $150 billion in sales each year. Areas of recent growth include natural food groceries, purchasing cooperatives, and worker cooperatives. Read more about Cooperatives...

Employee stock-ownership plan (ESOP) companies are for-profit entities in which employees own part or all of the companies for which they work. ESOP companies play a critical role in building the tax and wealth base of local communities, as ownership is rooted in the workers who reside in the community, making plant relocations less likely. ESOP companies are also less likely than comparable firms to lay off workers in downturns. Read more about Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs)...

Individual wealth building programs aim to increase the savings of low and moderate-income individuals. One of the pioneering efforts in this area is the Individual Development Account (IDA). Individual Development Accounts illustrate a central feature of the community wealth-building approach: namely, that to end poverty, communities—and the people in those communities—must be given the tools they need to develop their own, long-term income-generating capacity. Read more about Individual Wealth Building...

The international asset building and cross-sectoral strategies reviewed here provide illustrative models that suggest possibilities for future efforts in the United States. While we cannot be comprehensive of our coverage of international developments, the links and information sources here provide a good starting point for looking at exciting developments in asset strategies throughout the world. Read more about Outside the U.S....

Although many think of the "commons" as the common grazing land of medieval towns, the concept is much broader than that. Indeed, the United States is full of everyday commons management systems including public libraries, the Internet, blood banks, and parks. In addition, over 150 million acres are held in trust by states; much of this is leased for timber, grazing or oil production, with revenues going to public schools. For instance, proceeds from offshore oil and gas leases finance The Texas Permanent School Fund.

One feature of the U.S. economy is the growing importance of institutional investors, including pension funds, universities, and foundations. A September 2005 report by The Conference Board found that at the end of 2003, public sector pension funds alone had $2.27 trillion in assets, of which roughly $1.3 trillion were invested in stock. Public pension fund stock holdings totaled 9.7% of the stock market's value in 2003, up from 7.6% just three years before. Read more about Socially Responsible Investment...