Building Wealth to Increase Opportunities and Well-Being

Taking on Our Region’s Greatest Challenge

The Trust was created over a century ago to bring our community together to face our most pressing challenges and seize our greatest opportunities. It is because of our role as a community foundation that today we are focused on addressing the region’s wealth gap, which stands in the way of a thriving Chicago. Also aligned with our role as a community foundation, the Trust supports meeting people’s critical needs such as secure housing and healthy food, public safety, and regional response to unanticipated crises such as COVID-19.

At the Trust, we believe people are our region’s greatest asset. When everyone is contributing to and benefiting from our economy, our region will thrive.

Building wealth increases options and well-being.

While income is important because it helps people meet their daily needs, wealth allows them to invest and plan for their future. It’s about unlocking opportunities that have a huge impact on a person’s life, their children’s lives, and their larger community.

When individuals and families struggle with everyday bills and high debt and lack a cushion for emergencies, a single setback can quickly become a full-blown crisis. They have fewer options when it comes to basic life decisions, including where they live, where they send their children to school and daycare, how they get around, and what they eat—and that lack of choice extends to their ability to plan for the future.

On the flip side, when households are financially healthy, they can spend less than they earn, maintain savings for a rainy day, and access tools like credit and insurance to build toward long-term goals. They have greater freedom to choose how they spend their money and time. Having options when it comes to decisions such as housing, healthcare, childcare, education, transportation and food significantly improves quality of life.

For example, a person with a savings cushion can weather a job loss without going into debt. They can afford to buy a home and hopefully build equity for themselves and future generations. They can afford to dream, for instance pursuing higher education or opening their own business.

It’s not just about money in the bank. It’s about improving peace of mind and banking on a better future.

Let’s increase wealth, opportunities and well-being for every Chicagoan.

Our response to wealth inequities is vital to our region’s future. 

Since 2019, the Trust has been focused on narrowing the Chicago region’s wealth gap. At this point, we and our community partners have gained knowledge and collected data pointing ever more clearly toward both the ramifications of and reasons for the gap.  We are prioritizing three focus areas where we have expertise and can move the needle. For households and communities that have faced systemic barriers to building wealth, our goals are to: (1) increase income and financial assets, (2) increase residents’ homeownership and home equity, and (3) increase neighborhood investments while minimizing displacement.

Through partnerships, we can go even further. Whether you are a donor, a community leader, work for a nonprofit, lead a company, or serve as a local government representative, we invite you to join us in increasing opportunities for Chicagoans to build assets.