Family Finances

Spoken Word: Disrupting the Consumer Debt Market

October 18, 2018  • Financial Security Program

 

For the past year Aspen’s Financial Security Program, through the Expanding Prosperity Impact Collaborative (EPIC), has researched the drivers of rising consumer debt, identified a series of challenges that systematically turn debt into a source of deeply consequential financial insecurity for millions of households, and developed a framework for solving these problems.

We joined the Boston FinTech Week for the event,  Disrupting the Consumer Debt Market: Harnessing AI’s Power for Social Impact, co-hosted by Aspen EPIC, Cinch, Commonwealth, and FinTech Sandboxto bring together voices from Product Development, Computer Engineering, Academia, and Nonprofit FinTech to explore the potential of Artificial Intelligence to fundamentally transform the relationship between financially vulnerable Americans and consumer debt.

Monda Webb, poet, documentary filmmaker, and Senior Project Manager at EarnUp, delivered a powerful spoken word presentation as the keynote. This was followed by thoughtful conversation that uncovered the necessary inputs to ensure that AI generates positive outcomes for historically underserved communities. We learned that to reach its fullest potential, AI architects and product designers need to understand the fundamental relationships consumers have with their debts.

Enjoy Monda’s original piece and follow her on Twitter @mondawebb.