This is a very worthy cause. I know Jonathan and have worked and written for him for several years.
Please consider purchasing a copy of his book … and possibly pass it along to a young person.
Jonathan Clements | May 8, 2025
IT’S TIME TO PAY IT forward.
That’s a phrase I often use when talking about helping the next generation. But my efforts have been mostly focused on my children and grandchildren. What about others in future generations, especially those from less affluent families?
Welcome to the Jonathan Clements Getting Going on Savings Initiative and the accompanying book, The Best of Jonathan Clements: Classic Columns on Money and Life.
The savings initiative aims to get young adults started in the financial markets with $1,000 contributions to Roth IRAs, with those contributions funded by both direct donations and the royalties from the book. The book consists of more than 60 of my old Wall Street Journal columns.
I’d love to take credit for all of this, but my involvement has been modest. After my cancer diagnosis, there was a move to establish a journalism award in my honor. I suggested the savings initiative instead.
The heavy-lifting was then done by five luminaries of the personal-finance world: Christine Benz, Bill Bernstein, Karen Damato, Mike Piper and Allan Roth. I consider all five to be friends, and all have some involvement with the John C. Bogle Center for Financial Literacy. Also working on the initiative are two other groups: J-PAL North America and the City of Boston’s Summer Youth Employment Program.
Meanwhile, the fine folks at publisher Harriman House assisted with the book’s design, and The Wall Street Journal allowed my old columns to be reprinted at no cost. Indeed, the program is being supported by both the Dow Jones Foundation and News Corp., the Journal’s publisher.
You can read more about the savings initiative here, and also in Jason Zweig’s Wall Street Journal article from earlier today. Just to be clear, I’m not making any money from the book, and nor are any of the other participants. Want to pitch in? There are two ways:
I don’t know of any other program that takes young adults and gets them so directly involved in the financial markets, providing not just the money to get started, but also the investment vehicle as well. Will it lead some of these young adults to become regular savers and investors? If it does, lives will have been transformed. How cool is that?
Jonathan Clements is the founder and editor of HumbleDollar. Follow him on X @ClementsMon
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 
Here is what I posted on Humble Dollar.
“For the past four years, I have been pursuing a comparable concept with with members of Congress. Today, trying to get it into the reconciliation bill (“one big beautiful bill”) because it requires no taxpayer funding and results in no budget revenue losses.
Please contact your members of congress if you agree that Roth IRA is the way to go.
It is titled: “The Ben Franklin Child Roth IRA”. The concept is simple. You just change the tax code to incorporate for minor children of households with qualifying income by adding the same provisions that have applied to a spouse for spousal IRAs for 45 years – but limited to Roth.
This is the low- and middle-income solution that is comparable to the 529 to Roth IRA transfer likely to be used by higher income households – which was incorporated in Section 126 of SECURE. The Ben Franklin Child Roth IRA would be superior to using the 529 account – although, today, anyone can contribute to a 529, and the Roth is only available to a child with qualifying earnings.
Chris Carosa and I worked on this about a decade ago. https://fiduciarynews.com/2016/08/exclusive-interview-with-jack-towarnicky-child-iras-will-make-middle-class-millionaires/
I am presenting my own family’s experience, 529 to IRA, and the Ben Franklin Child Roth IRA next week at the World at Work Total Rewards Conference in Orlando, Florida. The presentation is titled: Ben Franklin’s Last Bet – “Bank for the Future”. I’ve incorporated the recent book written by Michael Meyer … on why Ben Franklin, based on his testamentary gifts in 1790 to the cities of Philadelphia and Boston. For my children, born in 1984 and 1987, we used the Uniform Gifts to Minor’s Act.
Here is a related post from 401kSpecialist.com:
https://401kspecialistmag.com/let-ben-franklin-create-middle-class-millionaires-eradicate-poverty-in-america/
If you like the idea, you might also contact Ashlea Ebeling at the WSJ who recently wrote extensively on Roth IRAs. Happy to pass along the a white paper summary of the Ben Franklin Child Roth IRA.”
I did want to note that the academics will be studying the Roth habits of individuals 18 – 22 years of age who are involved in a summer work program in Boston, MA, limited to those who earn $1,200 or more. They plan to track the young adults for 12 months. Sounds like a good academic project, one that you might want to support. However, I suspect the study will confirm a variety of outcomes – some will maintain the Roth account, some will contribute more to it, some will invest the money. Others will cash out. I expect the outcomes will look a lot like state mandated Roth IRA experience in California, Illinois, Oregon, etc. – except that the study subjects may not have an option to reject the contribution and take the cash. About one third of employees in those states reject the default, participation in a Roth IRA, and forego participation.
In addition to that study, I believe a second, different study should focus on children at as early an age as possible to see if savings habits can be created earlier … at or before the teen years, when many form their buying, debt and other financial habits. So, today, that study would focus on children who earn money from whatever occupation (cutting grass, shoveling snow, babysitting, delivering newspapers, etc. – (some still do that stuff). They could get the same kind of financial support (up to $1,000, equal to their earnings), invest the money, and watch the Roth account grow. Importantly, for a 10 year old, that $1,000 needs to be expressed as $1,000 of clothes and designer kicks today, or, at say 7%, that same $1,000 will be $7,600 at age 40, $15,000 at age 50, $30,000 at ag 60, $58,000 at age 70, and $114,000 at age 80. Nothing wrong if they choose the clothes and kicks, only important to ensure that they know they have the choice, control.
Or, for those children at even younger ages, leverage a gift of $1,000 from a related or an unrelated individuals to a 529 account – converted to a Roth IRA after 15 years.
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