'BRITAIN : BABY BONDS' : STUDENTS ECONOMICS

GIVE MONEY TO BABIES : THE baby bonds program, which builds on the work the economist Darrick Hamilton and William Darity Jr., is an elegant approach to reducing those racial gaps.

EVERYONE born in Britain between September. 1, 2002 and Jan. 2, 2011, received baby present from the government : a saving accounts that could not be tapped until the child turned 18, with an initial balance of between 250 and 1,000 pounds, depending on the family's income.

This month, the oldest recipient started turning 18 and gained access to that money. Some of the accounts hold more than Pound 5,000 [$6,480].

As any 18 year old can tell you, money is the best of all possible high school graduation presents. It unlocks the gates of opportunity. And the British program gave money to children from families that had little of their own.

The gifts were intended to chip away at the inequalities of wealth, and the resulting inequalities of opportunity, that weigh on developed nations.

Philip Murphy, the governor of New Jersey, proposed just recently to create a similar program for children in his state, which could be the first such program in the United States. 

The ''baby bonds'' program would create a $1,000 savings account for each child born into a New Jersey household with an annual income below about $131,000.

The money eventually could be put toward school tuition, a down payment on a house or starting business. Mr. Murphy's office estimates roughly three-quarters of the state's newborns would be eligible - around 72,000 children next year.

It is a proposal with the potential to change the trajectory of individual lives, giving New Jersey kids a better chance to to thrive and prosper.

Black people are particularly disadvantaged by inequalities of wealth and opportunity in the United States - inequalities that are substantially a result of past and present racism.

Black households with children have on average about one penny in wealth for every dollar held by white households with children, according to a recent analysis by the sociologists Christine Percheski and Christina Gibson-Davis. 

That wealth gap has increased in recent decades and, strikingly, the gap between Black and white households with children is wider than the overall wealth gap for Black and white households.  

Broader programs command broader support. The program would help everyone who needs it. It would create a baseline for individual wealth, limiting inequality in much the same way as free public schooling limits inequalities in education.

The disproportionate need among Blach children would be reflected in the distribution of the benefits.

The Honor and Serving of the Latest Global Operational Research on Inequalities and Economic solutions, continues. The World Students Society thanks the editorial writers of The New York Times.