The Ford Foundation published a guest post on their blog, written by Commonwealth Executive Director Timothy Flacke, about the launch of Prize Savings, the first nationwide Prize-Linked Savings (PLS) product on a prepaid card designed by Commonwealth in partnership with Walmart and Green Dot Bank.

In Prize Savings: Marrying a social sector idea with private sector scale, Tim lays out the history of PLS, beginning with the first accounts in the US in 2009 and the beginning of our work with Walmart, when Senior Vice President Daniel Eckert attending a convening on how to apply PLS concepts to prepaid cards. Over the following years, Daniel brought the idea back to his team at Walmart, where they partnered with Green Dot bank to bring PLS features to the Walmart MoneyCard, with help from Commonwealth.

He concludes by hoping that the success of this approach – of marrying social sector ideas with private sector scale – can be used to lead and influence others, from government to employers, to create innovative solutions to big social problems. Read the full post on their blog, Equals Change.