Integrating Financial Capability and Asset Building Strategies into the Public Workforce Development System

While employment is critical to attaining a stronger economic future for American workers, the development of financial capability strategies related to personal savings, asset building, managing credit, and individual budgeting are critical for sustaining financial security. This security, in turn, helps individuals achieve employment outcomes.

American Job Centers (AJCs) are uniquely positioned to extend the promise of financial stability to prospective job seekers and workers with disabilities by serving as a bridge to accessing accurate informational resources and successful strategies to assist in improving one’s financial capability. Through collaborative efforts with other federal agencies, Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) mandated partners, community-based organizations, local asset building programs, and the financial services sector, America’s workforce development system can leverage the power of partnerships to facilitate access to financial capability services for their customers within American Job Centers and in the broader community.

This paper describes some of the replicable models that AJCs have established to provide financial capability services.