Ray Boshara

The Global Assets Project and the Citi Foundation invite you to attend a reception on Wednesday, July 30 2008 to celebrate the launch of their new report: "Global Savings, Assets and Financial Inclusion: Lessons, Challenges and Opportunities" This report highlights insights and findings from the 2007 Global Symposium on Savings, Assets and Financial Inclusion, addressing emerging global trends, opportunities and collaborations across the fields of asset building, microfinance, policy and financial… more

Foreword

In 2000, 196 Member States of the United Nations committed themselves to halve extreme poverty in the world by the year 2015. Since then, broad availability of well-designed and appropriately delivered financial services and products, including those that lead to savings and productive assets, has become increasingly recognized as essential to alleviating poverty and fostering economic security and opportunity. Yet eight years later (and with less than eight years remaining to reach this goal), some three billion people worldwide… more

"By some estimates, payday loans topped $28 billion last year, and have doubled every year for the past five years. These numbers are really frightening." -Sheila Bair, Chairman, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, April 19, 2007 Join the New America Foundation/Asset Building Program and the Institute for American Values for a timely conference on thrift and its increasingly important role in reducing and managing personal and societal debt. Speakers will discuss changing the debt culture, solutions to payday… more

Full article

A coalition of consumer advocates, public policy groups and academics wants to attack our country's dependence on debt by creating a national campaign much like the one used to curb smoking. . .

The organizations leading this effort include the Institute for American Values, the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture, the New America Foundation, Public Agenda, Demos, the Consumer Federation of America, and the National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions. . .

The coalition… more

The presentation is available below in Microsoft Powerpoint format.

While the President signs into law a $152 billion stimulus package to jumpstart the economy, millions of Americans continue to rack up consumer debt, watch their home values slide, and worry about their futures with little to no savings. In fact, even with stimulus checks on the way to promote consumption, Americans are focusing on the need to rein in their debt and save more. A recent Harris Interactive poll found that when it comes to using the… more

Time to Make Outsaving the Joneses a Reality (Houston Chronicle)

"One in seven families is dealing with a debt collector," Ray Boshara and Phillip Longman of the New America Foundation think tank wrote in a Washington Post commentary. "Children today are more likely to live through their parents' bankruptcy than their parents' divorce," they wrote. And that likelihood will increase this year. ...

Today, the New America Foundation Asset Building Program commended San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s innovative proposal to endow every child born in the city with a $500 Baby Savings Bond. The money, which would earn interest over time, would be available when the student graduates from high school, to be used for college costs or towards a first home.

“We applaud this bold, forward-looking proposal. Now that San Francisco has set the stage, we look to California and… more

Concerned about the nation's poor savings rate, lawmakers such as Sen. Hillary Clinton have been talking about getting the government directly involved in establishing savings accounts for children.

The New York senator caused a stir last month when she said she would like to see every newborn receive a $5,000 bond that could be used later for college or a home purchase. Her remarks drew derision, and she has since backed away from that idea. About 4 million babies are… more

Countrywide Financial, the nation’s largest mortgage lender, has a curious new idea -- or, more precisely, an old one. No longer will it use wads of Chinese cash recycled through Wall Street to make subprime loans to unqualified borrowers. Instead, it will take in deposits from small savers and lend them out to people who might actually repay them -- just like that humble thrift institution president George Bailey did in It’s a Wonderful Life.

Imagine: a bank that promotes thrift!… more