Can You Fight Poverty by Paying Kids to Go to School?

With the prices of solar technology dropping and the opportunity to save drastically on energy usage and costs, businesses and organizations across the country are investing more in solar infrastructure for their buildings and facilities. The Better Buildings Initiative of the US Department of Energy is helping by providing guidance and documenting effective approaches and financing for renewables installations - from hotels, to schools, to big box retail.

Years of misrule and a subsequent dearth of hard currency, along with crippling bank-fostered debt cycles and exorbitant home mortgage interest rates, have created immense suffering for Myanmar's poor. But with the guidance of a local NGO, Women for the World, a pilot project helped women in some of Yangon's poorest neighborhoods capitalize on their cultural "head-of-household" status; by forming and managing community savings cooperatives, the women have instilled trust through local control and, above all, enabled members to secure land, build homes, buy food, and even generate profit through loans to families' business enterprises.

In a rapidly gentrifying Mexico City neighborhood, two artists refurbished an icon and set up an altar for Santa Mari La Juaricua, a saint to protect residents from eviction. The saint raises awareness and acts as a reminder about housing issues and the icon has been taken up by the residents and has been used in processions and protests.

In Jackson, Mississippi, a series of community-led cooperatives are creating opportunities for affordable home ownership. This is part of a trend across the country to create community land trusts. They are financed through donations, other community businesses, or commissions. Though each land trust faces hurdles, they are collectively allowing more access to wealth and ownership in historically low-income neighborhoods.

Since the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act passed, investors, community leaders, and local governments have been talking about Opportunity Zones. These are low-income areas in each state--Alabama has 150--that will incentivize investor spending by providing tax breaks for longer-term investment in areas typically not on the highest priority list for traditional investors. Montgomery, Alabama is seeking input from local groups on where funding can best be spent. Though the opportunity zones legislation is in its early days, many are excited about the potential to stimulate economic growth.

Some urban planners argue that urban spaces should be designed around children because that makes a livable, walkable space for everyone, and also contributes to healthy early brain development. Several initiatives are underway in and around Johannesburg, South Africa to redesign public spaces and make them more welcoming. At least one community group is working with children, teenagers and people who work with children to identify places that could be improved for better child protection.

Small towns located deep in the valleys of steep mountains, like Rjukan, Norway, and Viganella, Italy, can be cut off from sunlight for almost half a year but computer-controlled mirrors are helping to change that. The tailor-made, computer-driven motors on giant mirrors track sunlight throughout the day.

Mosaic Development Partners (MDP) seeks to create wealth for the black community in Philadelphia by providing affordable housing and creating opportunities in neighborhoods that are considered risky investments for typical real estate companies. The black-owned company has created housing as well as retail opportunities for minority and women-owned businesses who historically have a harder time accessing capital and loans. The company is mission-driven but operates on a for-profit model, finding economic solutions for systemic problems that have kept black communities from creating generational wealth.

The Kansas City Streetcar provides fare-free transportation for residents, which helps to get them downtown and promote more economic development. The fare-free streetcar also makes transit more equitable by removing barriers for low-income passengers and improving mobility for people with disabilities.

The Nusantra Fund provides financial support directly to community-led projects in Indonesia. The aim is to improve the livelihoods of Indigenous and local people while tackling climate change impacts and protecting biodiversity.