Community Wealth Building is happening in many areas across the US and globally. As mentioned above, CWB is helping cities and localities bring all of these elements together for the first time in a strategic, holistic way.  Many are already deploying elements of CWB across the different pillars in bespoke ways.  The key, however, is bringing all the elements together as the Wedge.

The crises we face are driven by the extractive nature of our existing system – concentrated ownership, community disinvestment, attacks on labor, environmental degradation, and structural social and racial injustice.

TDC has been pioneering community wealth building since 2005.  Over the course of these last two decades, we have steadily grown community wealth building (CWB) as a concept and practice, working with valued funders and partners across the US and beyond.  

A banking crisis and economic downturn more than a century ago brought postal banking to America’s shores. During the current crisis, millions of people have to wait months for government stimulus checks, and commercial banks have either balked at or buckled under the task of getting billions of dollars in aid to endangered small businesses.

Momentum is growing around state-based efforts to disrupt the US pharmaceutical market and assure both affordable and equitable access to essential medicines through public production.

As part of our global work on community wealth building (CWB) and movement building, our President, Ted Howard, will be on a fact finding and advisory trip to Scotland, UK. Scotland is at the UK and European forefront on community wealth building, with CWB a key part of the Scottish Government’s economic transformation programme.

Since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in the United States, calls for nationalization of various industries—from the airlines and Big Pharma to the energy grid, hospitals, and entire supply chains—have erupted from even the unlikeliest proponents.

For decades, we have been sold a myth of private health. It is a myth that our health is largely a product of individual choices and personal responsibilities. It is a myth that our healthcare is a service that private corporations can provide, and for which we must pay to survive.

Exciting developments are happening globally in Community Wealth Building. From its origins in Cleveland, and then Preston, UK, the Community Wealth Building(CWB) movement continues to grow in USA and globally.

The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and response from state and federal regulators serves as an urgent reminder that the U.S. banking system remains overly-financialized and fragile and poses a continuing systemic risk to the American and global economies.

Las crisis que enfrentamos son impulsadas por la naturaleza extractiva de nuestro sistema actual—la concentración de tenencia de los bienes, la desinversión de las comunidades, los ataques al trabajador, la degradación del medio ambiente, y el racismo estructural.

Las raíces modernas de la CRC datan desde el New Deal (los programas del Nuevo Trato del Presidente Roosevelt) hasta el movimiento de los derechos civiles, e incluso en muchos de sus aspectos estos principios, de tenencia colectiva de los bienes, datan desde mucho antes.

Prescription drugs in the United States cost way too much, nearly double, in fact, what they cost in other wealthy nations. The pharmaceutical companies that make them, and that rake in the profits from their sale, argue that we must pay those prices in order to support the world class research required to develop the drugs.

This new report holds out the prospect of a very different developmental path for Ireland, North and South—one capable of truly delivering for its people and communities.

Across the world Community Wealth Building(CWB) is growing. And through our global network and development activity, TDC is ready to assist and help administrations and locations in their development of CWB. So with a packed range of engagements, I recently undertook a 2 week advisory tour of Australia. I found a significant enthusiasm for CWB with some exciting activities taking place.

I am excited about the future of TDC because we have strong, credible answers to the questions many are pondering: How can we operate the economy in a way that more people can equitably benefit from the wealth that is created? How can we effectively bring more voices and influence to bear by those who have been left out of decisions that impact the public good? I look forward to helping TDC answer those questions and enhancing the organization’s reach and impact in many ways.

The Democracy Collaborative’s work is as essential today as it was when Gar Alperovitz and I founded it 22 years ago as an academic research center at the University of Maryland, College Park. Both Gar and I are immensely proud of TDC’s accomplishments and enthusiastic about its future as we turn the organization over to a new generation of brilliant, talented leaders who are poised and ready to take TDC into an exciting new phase of its work. We know that TDC’s brightest days are ahead.

Ten years ago what's become known as 'The Preston Model' got it's start with a learning exchange, a desire for radical change, and maybe even a few beers! Here, leader of the Preston City Council, Matthew Brown, reflects on what's gone into it, the hard work still to come, and the movement it's spurred in the UK.

Our healthcare sector has become highly financialized. To meet the demands of investors for swift and high returns, Wall Street has found that making money from money is quicker and easier than making money from long-term investments in the infrastructure, maintenance, and human resources so desperately needed to provide high-quality services in a sector like healthcare. For the sake of patients, this must change.

The ICA Group has been a catalyst for multiple ownership transitions that have had real impact on the lives of workers. Here are some lessons from the field in the journey of employee ownership transition.