Blogs
In preparing to participate in the Slow Living Summit later this month in Brattleboro, VT, I reflected on the meaning of Slow Money.
Is Slow Money the pace at which the return comes back to the lender/investor? Not to me. I think it is more about slowing down enough to examine whether you’re using your investment dollars in ways that are strategic, open-minded and likely to achieve your goals.
I believe this definition sticks whether you are an individual investor, institutional lender,...
2 hours 2 min ago
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In this week's The Economist, a data-driven economist makes the case for the power of hope in alleviating poverty.
When ecaping poverty seems to require a massive leap, says MIT economist Esther Duflo, "they often forego even the small incremental investments of which they are capable: a bit more fertiliser, some more schooling, or a small amount of saving."
What could/should we at the Community Loan Fund, in New Hampshire, in the United States, be doing to help people lift the gauze of...
2 hours 20 min ago
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By Craig Welch
There is very clear evidence that the surest path to financial security in America today is to obtain a college degree.
With that evidence comes a dispiriting fact: Only 25% of Americans have one.
People who have earned a Bachelor’s degree earn 70% more than those without, a gap that is widening in this new global economy. High school graduates are twice as likely to be unemployed as are workers with Bachelor’s degrees.
These are troublesome facts for a nonprofit like ours, whose...
3 weeks 5 days ago
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By Mike LaFontaine
Most social and economic problems are so complex that it is impossible to name any one factor as the “cause,” so analyzing them is usually best done through a wide lens.
The foreclosure crisis is a good example of how difficult it is to sort through the stew of contributing factors: inadequate regulation and financial complexity, low-cost foreign capital at the national level and easy access to low-cost home loans at the local level, investors chasing higher interest rates...
6 weeks 1 day ago
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By Ron Thompson
Maintaining a good credit score can mean the difference between getting and not getting a loan needed for a home or car. More recently, maintaining a good credit score can also affect your ability to get the job or rent the apartment you want.
Here are five quick and easy ways to improve and maintain a healthy credit score:
1. Keep those cards open. A credit score is influenced by how much credit we have available to us, compared to how much we have used. Older credit is also...
8 weeks 1 day ago
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By Craig Welch
Sixteen homeowners in Hooksett, N.H. may be forced out of their homes soon, and under New Hampshire law, the owner of the property has every right to do it.
The owner of Park Place mobile home park is seeking approvals to build an apartment complex on the site, and in doing so will need all of the homes and homeowners to leave. Because the homeowners lease the land beneath their houses, they have no property rights, only a state law that says the landlord must give them 18...
22 weeks 2 days ago
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By Gary Faucher
You’ve heard it. I’ve heard it. …
“They won’t help.” “They want to spend money we don’t have.” “They never come to meetings.” “They think we’re the landlord.” On and on and on it goes.
When I hear this during a meeting at a resident-owned community, it always raises a question for me: Who are they? I quickly follow up with a “Wait a minute, they are we,” as in WE, the owners of the cooperative, and as in WE are all in this together.
Like it or not, disagreements occur in every...
23 weeks 1 day ago
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By Jennifer Hopkins
Our friends at CFED have just released “With the Stroke of a Pen: Two dozen low-cost, politically viable state policy ideas to increase financial security and opportunity in tough fiscal times.”
The report reminds that, even in tough fiscal times, state policymakers can choose to help households that are on the edge of financial security. CFED's proposals include many that are cost-neutral and that expand economic opportunity and help people build bright futures.
“With the...
23 weeks 2 days ago
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By Julie McConnell
I have written on several occasions about the importance of investing in early childhood education as a community development strategy, one documented and supported by some of the nation’s leading economists.
However, it also pays to state the obvious – as pointed out recently by Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman. Friedman asked in a November 19 commentary, “How About Better Parents?”
Friedman cites recent research that highlights the power of...
25 weeks 2 days ago
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By Mike LaFontaine
The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco recently published an analysis, Addressing Widening Income Inequality through Community Development.
In addition to providing an excellent summary of the various factors that have led to the current disparity of incomes in America, the analysis was particularly relevant to me as a community developer because it framed the issue in more-global terms than usually presented.
Two quotations mentioned in the study nicely summarize the...
27 weeks 5 days ago
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