Week of January 4, 2016

1. Financial Lives of Americans: Featuring research from the US Financial Diaries project, the first post in a new blog and webinar series explores how the financial lives of low- and middle-income Americans have changed in the past few decades...and how programs and policies designed to help them also need to change. Stanford Social Innovation Review

2. Future of Microfinance: "It’s time to reframe the research questions – setting aside the question of whether 'microfinance' can 'solve poverty' and moving on to a next generation of research which accurately reflects both the nature and the intentions of current financial inclusion practice." NextBillion

3. Banking for Migrants: Lack of identification, strict regulations, and language difficulties often deter large banks from providing services to migrants. But many community-based financial institutions (in America and Europe) are finding new ways to serve migrant populations. The Economist

4. Racial Wealth Gap: Historically discriminatory policies have led to a persistent racial wealth gap in the US. According to 2013 data, the average low-income white family had $375 in savings while the average African-American family had $5. With such a small cushion, even small financial setbacks can be potentially devastating to households. The New York Times

5. Postal Banking: India Post, the largest post office network in the world, announced plans to operate as a payment bank by the end of the year. It's broad reach can potentially help to increase financial inclusion and coverage for cash transfer programs. Bloomberg

July 1, 2026

Financial Access Initiative

The Same As It Ever Was Edition

Editors’ Note: Hi, Laura and Jonathan here. A few of the pieces this week come from people who spent years up close with how poor households actually handle money, and keep coming back with something more tangled than the story usually told, and more persistent. Tim will be back for the next edition. - Laura Freschi and Jonathan Morduch

June 26, 2026

Laura Freschi and Timothy Ogden

Financial inclusion’s efficiency is now exposure: Four notes from the faiVLive webinar on emerging AI cyberthreats

The idea for this conversation was born from alarm. At the news that the US Treasury Secretary and the Chair of the Federal Reserve had called a meeting with the CEOs of the twenty largest banks in America to talk about threats to the financial system from emerging frontier AI models, Tim had questions: what about the community banks, the credit unions, and the CDFIs—the financial institutions that serve low-income communities and small businesses in America? When will they be invited to the meetings on how to defend their systems against AIs that can exploit software vulnerabilities with unprecedented ease and speed? And globally, are the regulators in middle-income and developing countries also holding meetings to discuss how they can defend against these threats? Will those meetings include anyone beyond the largest banks?

May 19, 2026

Tracy Cole

What it Takes to Improve Small Business Job Quality: Midterm Findings from Shared Success

Small businesses in the US employ nearly two-thirds of workers earning low wages, making them central to both economic mobility and the quality of work itself. Shared Success, launched by Aspen Institute's Economic Opportunities Program with support from the Gates Foundation, is built on the premise that job quality is fundamental to economic resilience, particularly in historically underserved communities. The project worked with 11 community development financial institutions (CDFIs) to embed job quality support into their programming.

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