Ray Boshara, a longtime Aspen FSP collaborator and contributor, has recently come on board as a Senior Policy Advisor within our Inclusive Saving and Investing portfolio. We sat down with Ray to learn more about his experiences crafting early wealth building policy and the opportunities he sees today for this vital work.

Tell us a little bit about what makes you tick. What are you passionate about? How do you prefer to show up in the world? 

I’ve always been motivated by the power of good ideas to improve people’s lives. So when—as a young Congressional staffer charged with finding new ideas to help move families up the economic ladder—I came across Michael Sherraden’s Assets and the Poor, I was immediately struck by how groundbreaking his idea was. Little did I know that idea would shape the remainder of my professional life.

When I’m not working, it’s my family, friends, and music that I’m passionate about; hearing live music with good friends and family really makes me feel alive. As I write, I’m flying to Denver to hear Gregory Alan Isakov at Redrocks with my daughter and son-in-law.

Share more about your long-standing relationship with Aspen FSP. How have you worked with our program over the years?

My partnership with Aspen goes back at least 30 years, starting with Peggy Clark’s Economic Opportunity Program and the precursor to FSP—Lisa Mensah’s Initiative on Financial Security.

But it’s Ida’s tenure that has really brought me close to Aspen FSP—first as co-authors of a book and then, earlier this year, becoming part of the team as a Senior Policy Advisor on Aspen FSP’s Inclusive Saving and Investing team! 

Among the best things Ida and I did together, during COVID and while I was still at the Fed, was publish The Future of Building Wealth. As an advisor to Aspen FSP now, I’m eager to leverage many of the great thinkers and ideas we featured in that book, which tried to address the question, “What are some of the best ideas out there to broadly build saving and ownership among those who save and own little?” We elevated over 60 ideas and over 100 authors in that book.

What brought me to Aspen FSP this time around? After leaving the St. Louis Fed after over 11 years there—where I founded and directed a research center on family balance sheets—I decided to focus my next (and possibly final) chapter on seeing automatic investments accounts at birth become law. I was ready to move from documenting inequality to trying to help solve it.

So I joined Senator Bob Casey’s team in 2022, drafted his 401Kids bill and, after he lost his re-election bid, I decided to continue that work with Aspen FSP (as well as WashU’s Center for Social Development, where I am also a Senior Policy Advisor). Working with Jason, KC, and Karen—and a whole raft of experts from across sectors—to help provide policymaker education during the Trump Accounts development process has been really exciting. The energy now is on successful implementation and explaining their potential to the world, and we’re thrilled to have some runway and resources to support this over the long run.

What first ignited your interest in early wealth building?

As mentioned, it was reading Michael Sherraden’s draft of Assets and the Poor back in 1991. While Sherraden proposed accounts at birth, a whole range of factors meant that we had to test this new “asset building” idea with the working poor—namely, to overcome the widespread doubt at the time (especially and perhaps ironically among progressives) that lower-income families could and would save.

Well, when they did save, public policies took off like lightning—especially Individual Development Accounts (landing me, I’m proud to say, in the Oval Office with President Clinton to witness the signing of the Assets for Independence Act into law). Then, in about the mid-2000s, when I was heading up New America’s Asset Building Program, we turned our attention to what we now call early wealth building, and succeeded in getting several bipartisan bills off the ground. All of these were precursors to Trump Accounts.

If you were to explain early wealth building to someone who had never heard of it, how would you describe it?

I say, “In addition to having a paycheck, do you like having some savings, a few investments, a home, a college degree or college savings for your kids, possibly a small business, and a retirement account?” Well, wouldn’t lower-income people want those things too—that sense of security, that ability to plan for the future, that comes with owning and not just earning? Until about 30 years ago, policymakers would not let lower-income families save and build assets—and now they do.

In your estimation, what do the strongest early wealth building programs have in common?

Great leaders and great teams! Beyond that, which was a lesson learned, having the actual savings in some centralized savings plan structure, like most CSAs do now—so that staff can focus on working with families, generating other contributors, teaching financial basics, etc. But the strongest programs also work backwards, meaning they envision the CSA public policy they want to see, then design and test a program that lays a foundation for that. I’ve been fond of saying, “Don’t start where you don’t want to end up.” So the strongest early wealth building programs always have an end game, especially public policy, in mind.

What’s one thing you wish everyone knew or understood about early wealth building?

I wish everyone understood that it’s not just about the money; it’s also about hope, a future orientation and sense of ownership that comes with having a savings and investment account. Surprisingly, you don’t need much money in the account to get those effects. “Small savings, big impacts,” we sometimes say.

What do you think is the biggest opportunity in early wealth building right now?

Clearly, Trump Accounts—a huge downpayment on a big idea, one that needs to be much improved over time. It’s in no one’s interest for these accounts to fail. Thankfully, I’m part of a great team to make the most of this unprecedented opportunity.

What are you most looking forward to doing in your Senior Policy Advisor role with Aspen FSP?

Working more closely with my fabulous Inclusive Saving and Investing colleagues Jason, Karen, and KC. And then just being a formal part of Aspen FSP and of course the broader Aspen Institute team. There’s nothing like doing work you love with people you admire and respect, who also want to leave the world a little better off than we found it.