Perspective From the Right: Building a Cross-Ideological Consensus for Child Development Accounts

While proposals to create Child Development Accounts (CDA) have some support from all ideological perspectives, that support is most evident among liberal groups and least evident among conservatives. Unfortunately, many conservatives view CDAs as nothing more than a liberal attemp to create yet another new entitlement program at a time when the United States already runs a huge deficit.

How to broaden the appeal of CDAs is not really a mystery. Certain asset development efforts have had wide bipartisan support for some time. The bipartisan 2000 KidSave Account proposal shows one way to broaden the appeal of CDAs. Just as it is necessary to be aware of the beliefs and communication style of any group, supporters need to be target their appeals to answer skeptics from both sides. Using jargon or professional terms common to one idiological group may backfire alienating other groups. However, the effort to broaden support should produce a stronger, more popular CDA program that can better meet its goals and survive regardless of who controls the political process.

Project: College Success