Michael Sherraden will discuss potential federal policy for inclusive and progressive Child Development Accounts (CDAs), so that all U.S. children can accumulate assets, on March 20 at the National Press Club, in Washington, D.C.
Several states have already enacted statewide CDA policies, and a nationwide policy is possible.
Sherraden is the George Warren Brown Distinguished Professor at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, where he is director of the Center for Social Development. TIME magazine has called him one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Sherraden and co-researchers have accumulated a body of evidence supporting universal, progressive CDAs through research in several states in the U.S. and in Singapore, Israel and other countries.
A distinguished panel will join him at the press club:
- Mary McKay, the Neidorff Family and Centene Corporation Dean of the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis;
- Signe-Mary McKernan, vice president of the Center on Labor, Human Services, and Population, and co-director of the Opportunity and Ownership initiative at the Urban Institute;
- William Elliott III, a leading researcher in the fields of college savings accounts, college debt and wealth inequity;
- Colleen Quint, JD, president and CEO of the Alfond Scholarship Foundation, a nonprofit with a goal of increasing Maine’s educational attainment through increased college savings.
“The United States can now plant seeds for a future where all children—at every income level, of every race and ethnicity—build assets to support education and other life goals,” Sherraden says.
“They will grow up to become functioning adults with less debt. As a direct result, they will contribute more effectively to their communities and the overall economy. CDAs are a good investment.”
This event, part of the Social Work Day on the Hill, is sponsored by the Congressional Research Institute for Social Work, Brown School’s Center for Social Development and Clark Fox Policy Institute, and the Grand Challenges for Social Work.