What can I do?
Are you in crisis?
If so, 211.org is the best way to connect with someone how can help.
Employers
Asset poverty affects you. It has a big impact on our community’s overall wellbeing and competitiveness. Asset poverty can potentially have a negative impact on the lives of your employees and your business.
As an employer, one of the most important actions you can take to protect your employees and strengthen your business is to provide a living wage.
Providing a living wage recruits better talent and creates an environment of pride and value among all employees.
What can I do?
As an employer, there are many steps you can take to mitigate the effects of asset poverty, both in your business and within our broader community:
Become a Living Wage Employer by taking the Forsyth Living Wage pledge.
Promote awareness and education of asset building with employees.
Build awareness of the issue of asset poverty within your networks.
Financial Educators
The Asset Building Coalition is here to provide support for financial educators in Forsyth County.
If you provide financial education services, we would love to connect with you! Whether its through our financial capabilities best practices certification, helping connect you to resources, sharing information on the impact of asset poverty, or helping you find data for grant requests, the Asset Building Coalition is here to help!
Financial Capability Best Practice Standards
Government
Asset poverty has a major impact on Winston-Salem and Forsyth County.
Many in our community are just one or two paychecks away from losing financial stability. This state has a major impact on our residents’ quality of life, and has a cumulative negative impact on our community as a whole.
Community Data At-a-Glance
DATA SOURCE: PROSPERITY NOW ESTIMATES USING SIPP AND ACS, 2014
- Households in Winston-Salem Experiencing Asset Poverty 39%
- Forsyth County Households Living in Extreme Asset Poverty 22%
- Forsyth County Residents with Sub-prime Credit Scores 56%
- Renters in Winston-Salem Experiencing Housing Cost Burden 49%
- Low-Income Winston-Salem Residents who are Uninsured 35%
- Forsyth County Single-Parent Households in Asset Poverty 60%
What can I do?
Read and get engaged with the Asset Building Coalition’s local advocacy agenda.
Schedule a time for a coalition member to talk with you or present to your group.
Become an advocate for local employers to take the Forsyth Living Wage Pledge.
Nonprofits
Asset Poverty is a condition in which an individual or a family does not have three months worth of living expenses set aside in savings.
Those experiencing asset poverty are at a higher risk of facing a major life disruption or crisis associated with certain unexpected expenses.
Did you know?
Asset Poverty is different from poverty in general and it affects more Forsyth County residents than you might think.
- Households in Winston-Salem Experiencing Asset Poverty 39%
- Forsyth County Households Living in Extreme Asset Poverty 22%
- Forsyth County Residents with Sub-prime Credit Scores 56%
Are you making an impact?
If you have an existing program or an idea for a new program to take action around the issue of asset poverty, local data can help make your grant requests and impact reporting stronger. Forsyth Futures helps local organizations find the data they need to make targeted requests – reach out today to see how they can assist your grant-writing and reporting efforts.
What other steps can I take as a member of a service organization?
Build awareness around the community impact of asset poverty in your networks.
Reach out and invite an ABC member to present to your Board, staff, or stakeholder group.
Join the ABC as a collaborative member.
Work with us to define and discover novel asset building strategies.
Participate in the ABC's advocacy efforts.
Reach out to the ABC to discuss how to best coordinate and align your organization’s resources and activities to support community-wide asset-building goals.
There’s a lot that non-profits can do to advocate for smart local policies and funding decisions; the ABC is working to make these activities clear and simple for our non-profit colleagues.
Familiarize yourself with our asset building resources.
This site catalogs a wide range of informational support, services, and tools to help further efforts to make our community more resilient to asset poverty.