Empower your residents: begin with basic education 1

101More than anything else that we think we know about economic development (ED), be it in low-income communities or not, be it in the US or anywhere else in the world, we can state with bold confidence that education is the driving force behind the creation of true ED (Todaro & Smith 2014; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development 2010; Hanushek & Wößmann 2010; Checchi 2006; Heckman 2006). This relationship is widely recognized in the literature and the conventional wisdom of development both internationally and in the US.