By swarfield, Accion USA -

I’m a 20-something and to put it frankly, I am incredibly proud to be one. However, if you had the opportunity to read the recent New York Times article on 20-somethings, you would think that I am of the flaky, meandering, and average variety. I’m currently working at a unpaid internship (at ACCION USA), getting my masters degree, working a side job, and still getting help from my parents on a few (VERY few) of my bills.

So why am I so proud to be a 20-something? Because I am from a generation that has a voice. We are socially active, we care, and we want change. Think I’m wrong? If the most recent presidential elections showed one thing, it was that when 20-somethings want change, we speak LOUDLY and the world takes notice.

So what do 20-somethings have to do with microfinance? I’ll say it again: 20-somethings care. While the author from the Times argues that unpaid internships, the Peace Corps and Teach for America are ways 20-somethings are avoiding adulthood what they ignore is young people fighting to improve their communities, fighting to give every person in the world an equal chance to succeed, fighting for a cause. I’m not putting myself in debt up to my eyeballs and working jobs where I don’t get paid for nothing. I want to make a change.

I support, promote and—dare I say it—love microfinance for the opportunities it provides those who are unable to access loans through the commercial banks.  We can argue about my choice of career path (my family worries I’ll end up working for free forever), about the need for microfinance in the United States (how many struggling small businesses do you know?) but you will lose any argument that says that microfinance does not work and that 20-somethings don’t care about it.

ACCION USA Microfinance Council -group of 20-something professionals advocating for domestic microfinance and the growth economic opportunity in their community-is a perfect example. The microfinance revolution will be continued by groups like the Microfinance Council and other like minded 20-somethings and I argue it will become one of our great triumphs under the banner of economic equality. Why? Because we understand what it means to lack financial opportunity and to have potential but have a whole society daring us to fail. We share the struggles of microfinance clients and that reason fuels passion for the cause. And right now we are the ones in the field breaking down economic barriers …. one unpaid internship at a time.