A new year brings new research, tax season support, and timely policy insights.
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A Message from Our President & CEO
As we kick off our first newsletter of 2026, I want to thank you for being part of our community and for your commitment to expanding pathways to economic opportunity. Your engagement, partnership, and dedication make this work possible, and I’m grateful to begin a new year of learning, collaboration, and progress together.
Families and communities across our nation continue to face economic realities that make everyday stability harder to achieve. These challenges are complex, but there is real opportunity to strengthen the systems they rely on every day. At Prosperity Now, our focus this year is on turning evidence into practical tools, elevating insights from the field, and supporting partners working to help create jobs, grow businesses, and build strong communities.
From tax opportunity and housing and homeownership to family and child support and entrepreneurship, we will continue asking hard questions about what works, sharing what we learn, and helping innovative ideas reach the people and places where they matter most.
Thank you again for being part of this community and for the role you play in advancing financial stability and opportunity across our country.
With gratitude,
Marisa Calderon, President & CEO
Earlier this month, Prosperity Now partnered with the Tax Equity Funders Network to host a timely conversation on the future of no-cost tax return preparation and the role philanthropy can play in sustaining this critical infrastructure.
As tax season approaches, amid shifts in IRS capacity and evolving tools like Direct File, community-based programs such as VITA continue to serve as a trusted lifeline for families seeking accurate, no-cost tax support. This discussion brought together philanthropic leaders, practitioners, and policy experts to explore how coordinated investment and field infrastructure, including Prosperity Now’s Tax Opportunity Network (TON), help maintain quality, expand access, and reduce risk for taxpayers.
The conversation highlighted why continued philanthropic engagement matters now and how funders can support grantees navigating a rapidly changing tax filing landscape.
For decades, the Starter Home served as a primary entry point into homeownership. Today, rising prices, limited supply, and higher upfront costs have made that pathway increasingly out of reach, especially for first-time buyers.
In Homeownership in America: The Starter Home Is Dead. Now What?, Prosperity Now, Nestment, and Next Belt Strategies examine how today’s housing market has outgrown the traditional starter home model and what comes next. The report explores alternative pathways to ownership that reduce upfront barriers, share risk, and better align with how people live and buy homes today.
Behind every policy decision and research finding are real people and real experiences. Share Your Story is Prosperity Now’s platform for elevating lived experience and ensuring community voices help inform the systems that affect financial stability and opportunity.
We invite you to share your stories about navigating homeownership, credit, tax time, small business ownership, and other financial realities. These stories help inform research, influence policy conversations, and deepen understanding of how economic systems show up in everyday life.
By sharing your story, you can help inspire others, build connection, and ensure that solutions are rooted in the experiences of the people they are meant to serve.
📣ICYMI
Prosperity Now President & CEO Marisa Calderon recently published an op-ed in Open Banker addressing growing calls to cap credit card APRs at 10 percent.
While acknowledging the real strain rising interest rates place on household budgets, the piece cautions that a flat, arbitrary rate cap could unintentionally restrict access to safe credit, particularly for working families who rely on credit cards to manage income volatility or emergencies. Instead, the piece urges policymakers to pursue evidence-based approaches that lower borrowing costs while preserving access to responsible credit options.
Celebrating EITC Awareness Day
On January 23, we celebrated Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) Awareness Day, an important reminder of one of the most effective policies we have to support working families. The EITC helps millions of people who work hard every day to cover basic needs, strengthen financial stability, and support better outcomes for their children. Yet too many eligible workers still miss out.
No-cost, trusted tax return preparation is available through VITA sites nationwide. Making sure individuals know about these resources can help ensure more people receive the refunds they’ve earned.
