Contrary to what many people believe, the U.S.-Mexico border is not the wild, wild southwest border; it is a modernized 21^st century border that is rich in trade and economic opportunities. I represent a part of the United States where trade has become a part of daily life. 

Dr. Algernon Austin is the Director of the Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy (PREE) at the Economic Policy Institute. As the director of PREE, Dr. Austin oversees reports and policy analysis in the economic condition of America's people of color. 

Arturo Sarukhan, Mexican Ambassador to the United States, discusses the bilateral goals of national security and economic prosperity.

Ivy Ngo, Policy Advocate at the Southeast Asia Resource Action Center, speaks about the importance of social security, and other social insurance programs, for Asian American communities at a Capitol Hill briefing titled "What's at Stake? Proposed Deficit Reduction Measures Affecting Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid and the Impact on Communities of Color".

Over the past decade, Jeff Cruz has worked has worked on campaigns in more than a dozen states and has served as a policy advisor to Members of Congress and as an associate director in the White House.

Liz Fowler, Special Assistant to the President for health care and economic policy, discusses why the U.S. needed health care reform.

Leticia Miranda is the associate director of the Economic and Employment Policy Project at the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States.  The Economic and Employment Policy Project provides NCLR’s perspective on employment, energy, retirement, and poverty policy at the federal level.

Dr. Jared Bernstein discusses economic and social insurance reforms, the need for income security, closing the education and wealth gap, and promoting a vibrant middle class at the 2011 Color of Wealth Policy Summit.

Dr. Maya Rockeymoore interviews Meizhu Lui, former Director of the Closing the Racial Wealth Gap Initiative at the Insight Center for Community and Economic Development, to discuss the racial wealth gap, asset building and economic disparities among whites and people of color.

Anne E. Price has spent 20 years working in a wide range of areas including child welfare, hunger, welfare reform, workforce development, community development and higher education. She is the director of the Closing the Racial Wealth Gap (GRWG) Initiative at the Insight Center for Community Economic Development in Oakland, California. The Insight Center is a national research, consulting, and legal organization dedicated to building economic health in vulnerable communities.