Patient capital

Picture a homeless man in Chicago begging on the street.  He needs a meal, but he needs much more than that.  If someone handed him ten dollars a day and gave him a free apartment, would that do it for him?  It's just not good enough.  An unending river of money coming from somewhere else is not sustainable.

What the homeless man and poor neighborhoods and groups all over the world need -- is their own wealth, their own prosperity.

Micro loans are one way people can be helped toward building their own wealth (see Noam's story here).

The "patient capital movement" is another attempt to not only get a return on investment, but also to generate jobs and wealth that will be sustainable.  Read about one for-profit business,  "Earthwise Ventures" operating in Uganda, started with capital from U. S. investors.

CEO of the investor group, Jes Tarp, says, "“I became convinced that business, not charity, was the real hope of the poor.” He said charity as practiced in the West is well-intentioned and sometimes vital in disaster-relief situations but is also often “defective or inadequate.” Tarp believes “business has more to offer. It allows you to build an economic foundation.”