For A New Thrift

For A New Thrift: Confronting the Debt Culture

A Report to the Nation

Jointly authored by a number of distinguished scholars and leaders from across the political spectrum, For A New Thrift powerfully addresses the linked problems of overindebtedness, lack of savings, and growing inequality in the United States. The focus is on institutions. When a society creates democratic institutions to encourage thrift, more people are likely to engage in the positive activities of saving, conservation, and asset building. When a society fails to nurture such institutions, limits access to them, or supports institutions opposed thrift, more people are likely to over-spend, fall into consumerism as a philosophy of life, and go into debt. For A New Thrift: Confronting the Debt Culture includes recommendations for the future.

Copies are $7.00 each. To order, please download this pdf form.

Thrift: In Search of the Art of Living Well

A Traveling Exhibit

This exhibit is curated and designed by the Institute for American Values and Exhibit A Design Group of New York. Featuring first-source documents and artifacts from the 19th century through the present, the exhibit is a companion to, and a compelling visual context for, our Conference. The exhibit’s goal is to convey the history and evolution of a complex cultural value and encourage us to re-analyze its meaning and possibilities for our generation.

Opens on Monday, May 12, with a Reception, as a part of the Conference, “For a New Thrift.” (View exhibit brochure.)

*Film footage in the exhibit is used with permission from Quality Information
Publishers and A2Z CDs.

The Change Box

Save for Change!

It’s a small, beautiful box that hangs on your wall or sits on a surface in your home. You put your change (your spare coins) into it. The theme is “Save for Change!” The Change Box is designed specifically to help you think about what you want to save for – the “change” that you want to make happen through small but regular acts of saving. We would like to make the Change Box available to community and youth service groups, both in the U.S. and around the world. We anticipate that the Change Box will eventually be connected to an interactive web site for children focusing on thrift and stewardship.

Receive your Change Box by attending our Conference, “For a New Thrift.” (View conference agenda.)

Thrift Captain Button

A replica of a vintage National Thrift Week button, buy one for $3.00 or 2 for $5.00.

To purchase,