A new book about financial capability and asset building will be released next month. The 144-page book — “Financial Capability and Asset Building with Diverse Populations: Improving Financial Well-being in Families and Communities” — is aimed at policymakers, researchers and practitioners who assist financially vulnerable people.
Editors are Julie Birkenmaier, Margaret Sherraden, Jodi Jacobson Frey, Christine Callahan and Anna Maria Santiago. Birkenmaier and Sherraden are faculty directors of the Center for Social Development’s Financial Capability & Asset Building initiative.
The book, from Routledge, was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Community Practice and “underscores the importance of financial capability and asset building (FCAB) practice, policy and research during a period when vulnerable populations face increasingly difficult economic and financial realities,” according to Routledge’s website.
“At the same time, retrenchment and privatization of government-sponsored social services have eroded the safety net available for families experiencing poverty or near-poverty conditions. The proliferation of products and services available from both formal and informal financial institutions highlights the need to promote FCAB to avoid and/or recover from financial difficulties, crises and poverty.”