Evidence links greater wealth with better health, but wealth in America is unequally distributed by race. Communities of color face systemic barriers to opportunity, freedom and prosperity in the United States. Helping under-resourced and historically marginalized populations achieve economic mobility should be a goal at the top of all of our lists as funders and philanthropists. The most important work we can do is help lift individuals and families up, break the intergenerational cycle of poverty and create comprehensive tools for wealth generation to empower a given community in every way we can. Closing income and wealth gaps We know can directly impact other outcomes such as health, education, and access to safe, stable housing. Employee ownership, home ownership, and embedded finance are just a few tools we believe can be powerful but there are many more. We need to remove barriers to economic security and expand greater access for low income individuals to critical financial services, affordable housing, home ownership, and other tools to enable economic mobility.
For too long, BIPOC individuals have been relegated to the lower rung of society due to systemic injustices and barriers to generation of wealth. They have been excluded from owning a piece of an enterprise, owning property/other real assets, and have been excluded from the higher paying jobs in society. If we are to dismantle these injustices and their long-term impacts over the past 200+ years, we must be intentional with the deployment of our capital to affect that change.
