Ownership & Assets

To promote local economic development, California policymakers should create Banking Development Districts, a proven way to connect lower-income unbanked Californians with the financial products and services they need to enter the financial mainstream and begin to build savings and assets. It is modeled after New York State's successful Banking Development District program.

For the full text of the issue brief, please see the PDF attached below.

Today, May 21st, the New America Foundation and Center for Social Development (CSD) at Washington University in St. Louis announced a new College Savings Initiative to examine and improve "529" college savings plans so more people have the opportunity to attend and complete college.  

What is the Saver's Bonus?

The Saver’s Bonus is a policy proposal that would reward low- and moderate-income individuals and families who save at tax time. Every dollar deposited in a designated savings product would be matched with an additional dollar from the federal government, up to a $500 annual maximum. Participants would make or report contributions to an eligible account on their federal income tax return, and the bonus would then be transferred directly to the designated account. The… more

This measure would create the CA Kids program, providing a one-time, $500 deposit in an investment account at birth for the 560,000 children born in California each year. The state could match the savings of lower-income parents as they put aside money for their children. At just over $280 million for the first year, this relatively small investment - less than half a percent of the state's $100 billion dollar budget - would be transformative.

This measure creates a financial literacy program in the office of the Controller funded by a financial literacy fund established in the Office of the Treasurer.  It represents a much-needed commitment by the state to start addressing the root causes of personal financial struggles precipitated by a lack of consumer financial education and codifies the state's financial interest in reducing consumer debt and bolstering personal savings.

This measure would repeal the vehicle asset limit on CalWORKs to assist families in achieving economic self-sufficiency through work, create social and fiscal responsibility and restore the stated goal of the CalWORKs program.

The California Employee Savings Program creates a voluntary, universal, portable retirement account for California workers who do not have access to a workplace retirement savings plan. It would give six million California workers and their families an opportunity to have their own workplace retirement savings plans to supplement their basic Social Security benefits. The California Employee Savings Program would also give hundreds of thousands of California small businesses an easy, low-cost, voluntary way to offer a retirement savings plan to their

The CA Workforce Mobility and Savings Initiative, reforms the asset limit in the California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids (CalWORKs) program, to encourage low-income families to build the savings they need to permanently exit welfare. The measure repeals the $2,000 asset limit in CalWORKs for current recipients and raises it for new applicants from $2,000 to $7,000 while also eliminating the $4,650 vehicle limit. By reforming the asset limit, this measure restores the stated goal of the CalWORKs program by assisting families in achieving