Minding the Wealth Gap: Our Playbook to Close It Together

The US racial wealth gap is large, and it's compounding. It's time to close it. Minding the Wealth Gap shines a light on people doing this important work and explores how you can get involved too.

Generations of public and private practices have left Black households $15 trillion and 400 years behind white households. Engaging storytelling backed by data, Minding the Wealth Gap highlights the wide-ranging impact of this lack of wealth parity. It explores the intricate connections between issues such as housing disparities, employment opportunities, education, investment barriers, social networks, and over-policing, all of which contribute to the staggering wealth gap between Black and white households.

While the numbers are astounding, there is also hope. Investment professional Cliff Goins IV shines a spotlight on the courageous efforts of nine Black entrepreneurs and executives who are actively working to bridge this chasm:

- Kedra Newsom Reeves is a highly accomplished, very curious management consultant by day, serving as a partner at the Boston Consulting Group, where she drives holistic solutions to wealth creation.

- Mark Wilson became an accidental entrepreneur, then used his platform to empower economic mobility for under-resourced team members.

- C-suite executive Selena Cuffe is a world traveler and a talented business leader. She is a poster child for the power of cultivating diverse talent.

- Lee Henderson leveraged his role as partner at Ernst & Young LLP to help launch a network of resources to accelerate the growth of underserved ethnic minority-owned businesses.

- Shundrawn Thomas champions underdogs and unleashes access to financial and human capital as CEO of The Copia Group, a private investment firm.

- Tony Wilkins, an advisor for Google for Startups, is an entrepreneur whisperer, imparting wisdom and money that they need to flourish.

- Corporate lawyer turned entrepreneur George Fatheree III advocates for real estate justice and turbocharges home and land ownership.

- Small business banker Steve Hall locates the diamonds in the rough, putting capital to work in overlooked communities.

- Serial entrepreneur and sage Robert Blackwell Jr. is compelling large organizations to "just do business" and free the enterprises.

These "gap closers" have much to teach us, having pioneered initiatives such as empowering economic mobility, advocating for homeownership, and championing economic parity. Goins invites us to get in the game and become gap closers ourselves, unleashing trillions of dollars of potential trapped in our poorest communities. Minding the Wealth Gap is both a powerful catalyst and a call to arms, urging America's entrepreneurs, executives, government officials, and other leaders to join these efforts and take meaningful steps toward a more equitable future for all.

Cliff Goins IV is an investor in private companies. He also co-founded Scaleup, a startup that began in Amazon, which helps diverse-owned and other small and medium-size businesses grow into large enterprises. Goins has held roles at Northern Trust Asset Management, including COO of an early-stage fintech acquisition and head of strategy for the $1 billion business unit. He holds an MBA in finance and strategy from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and a BS in accounting from HBCU Florida A&M University. He is obsessed with tennis and lives near Chicago with his wife and two smart, beautiful, and sporty daughters.