How parents decide to participate and save in their children’s asset-building accounts: Implications for practice, policy, and theory

Publication year: 2011
Source: Children and Youth Services Review, In Press, Accepted Manuscript, Available online 11 January 2011

Jennifer, Wheeler-Brooks

Asset-based social welfare programs focus on helping low to moderate income citizens to accumulate wealth in the form of home ownership, savings, small businesses, and higher education. Individual development accounts, savings accounts in which account holders’ deposits are matched, are a vehicle often used in these programs. In a national demonstration of children’s savings accounts (individual development accounts for children) parents participated in focus groups to discuss how they decided to enroll in this asset-building program, how they decided to open accounts for their children, and how they saved in these accounts. Findings from this study have implications for assetbuilding…