OCTOBER 31, 2025

Goodman Philanthropies Awards $50,000 Grant to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center to advance the equitable design of Trump Accounts

Washington, DC — Goodman Philanthropies is pleased to award a $50,000 one-year grant to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center to support the U.S. Treasury Office of Tax Policy with expert guidance on the inclusive design and implementation of the newly created Trump Accounts. The grant will help ensure Trump Accounts — $1,000 investment accounts established at birth—are structured to build wealth inclusively and reach families with low incomes and low wealth.

Why Goodman Philanthropies Invested

If designed and implemented well, Trump Accounts could represent one of the most significant federal investments in child asset-building in decades. The idea is powerful: provide every child with an early financial stake, harness the power of compounding, and normalize long-term saving and investing from birth.

But policy design matters. Without careful attention to enrollment processes, contribution structures, tax treatment, and administration, Trump Accounts risk widening wealth gaps rather than narrowing them. “Effective early life wealth-building programs share common principles: automatic enrollment, progressive deposits, centralized account structures, and supports that reduce barriers for families with low incomes,’ said Madeline Brown, Senior Policy Associate at the Urban Institute. “This work focuses on helping Treasury design Trump Accounts in a way that reflects these principles, avoids unintended inequities, and ensures the program reduces—not widens—existing wealth disparities.” Goodman Philanthropies is investing in this work to help ensure the policy delivers on its promise for families with the fewest resources.

Scope of Grant

This grant supports expert guidance to the U.S. Treasury to help ensure Trump Accounts are designed and implemented in a way that truly benefits families with low incomes and low wealth. Drawing on research and real-world experience, the work focuses on how these accounts can be set up so that children who are least able to save on their own still receive meaningful benefits. This includes thinking carefully about how accounts are opened, how families are enrolled, how additional contributions can reach those who need them most, and how the program fits alongside other public benefits and savings programs.

The work will translate lessons from successful child savings efforts into clear, practical advice for federal policymakers. The emphasis is on reducing barriers, protecting families, and making the program easy to use and understand, while guarding against unintended consequences that could widen gaps in wealth. Overall, the grant aims to help Treasury implement Trump Accounts in a way that is fair, accessible, and effective at building long-term financial security for children across income levels.

About the Urban Institute’s Tax Policy Center

The Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center aims to improve tax and fiscal policy decision-making by producing independent, timely, and accessible analysis. We help policymakers, advocates, journalists, researchers, and the broader public understand how tax policy affects different groups of people, government revenues, and the economy. Learn more.

About Goodman Philanthropies

Goodman Philanthropies supports innovative, evidence-based solutions that expand economic mobility across the United States. We prioritize approaches that combine rigor, innovation, and scale to move the needle on poverty and opportunity. Our work is generously funded by Bennett & Meg Goodman, who are committed to dismantling barriers to upward mobility through strategic, impact-driven philanthropy. This grant is part of our broader wealth-building strategy, which aims to fund new and innovative tools, policies, and ideas that enable more low to moderate-income Americans to participate in asset-building as a mechanism for sustained, intergenerational economic mobility. Early wealth-building policies and programs, such as Trump Accounts, represent one such innovation that we believe, if designed well, have high potential to drive U.S. economic mobility at scale.

To learn more about our work and our portfolio of grants, visit www.goodmanphilanthropies.org.