Wealth is created where the opportunity of equity, financial prudence, and safety of profit meet.

In Chicago communities of color (C.O.C.), investment capital, income, and equity disparities continue to widen the racial wealth gap:

• “[Minority owned businesses] experience higher loan denial probabilities and pay higher interest rates than white-owned businesses even after controlling for differences in credit-worthiness, and other factors” (Romer, 2022).
• “During the COVID-19 pandemic, federal economic recovery investments (e.g. PPP loans) left most business owners of color without help” (Hunt et al., 2021).
• “There is a $220 billion annual disparity between Black wages today and what they would be in a scenario of full parity” (Hunt et al., 2021).
• “Over the past 30+ years, workers of color have experienced income disparity across all wage categories” (Hunt et al., 2021).
• “In Chicago, around 80% of Black and LatinX entrepreneurs are unable to get access to sufficient equity capital for their ideas, compared with 46% of their White counterparts. The result is an estimated $146 million equity capital gap” (Johnson et al., 2022).

Within Chicago C.O.C., this divestment limits opportunity for economic participation and creates an air of hopelessness for residents. Community members liken their experience to the lower level of a caste as they define the lack of investment as a plight predetermined by systemic leaders. Residents cite the crumbling infrastructure, breadth of vacant homes, and minimal locally-owned businesses within their community as evidence. The inequitable city investment in predominantly white communities versus C.O.C. within Chicago, IL, proves the validity of the caste-like experience in C.O.C.

Community members request an institution that drives new investment capital and generates equity with and for them. In response to this call to action, we offer CoLiberate USA. This is a community investment vehicle that accelerates wealth development within C.O.C utilizing a financial health improvement program (F.H.I.P.) and lucraitve, cooperative investment strategies.