Bootstrap Capital: Microenterprises and the American Poor

(Paperback)

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Description

The microenterprise strategy - helping people start small businesses - has generated attention among policymakers and the media as a way to create jobs and help lift people out of poverty. Through extensive interviews and case studies of five diverse microenterprise programmes in different US regions, the author examines the potential and limits of the strategy.

Reviews

"Microenterprise development programs have proliferated in the 1990s. As Servon brilliantly guides us through the complexities of assistance programs, the deeper issue--what works for whom--becomes clear. This pathbreaking study explains both the limitations of microenterprise and its important potential for helping many Americans to cope more successfully in today's dynamic economy." Tim Bates, Wayne State University

"This is a book about the American Dream--job, house, and dignity. Lisa Servon has captured the new path to the American dream for the poor in this country. The new dream is not about getting a job; it is about making a job. She points out that the poor can find their own dreams postwelfare reform with good training and a little capital.




" Edward J. Blakely, Robert J. Milano Graduate School of Management and Urban Policy

Author Bio

Lisa J. Servon is an associate professor and associate director at The New School's Community Development Research Center.