Venture Capitalists Target Poor Communities With $550 million under management, is it a sustainable asset class?

A small group of social venture capitalists - a number with Wall Street connections - are trying to put the tools of venture capital to work at job creation for low-income workers. Known as community development venture capital, this group of like-minded venture capitalists is attempting to balance the need for profits and risk-weighted returns with the social goals of job creation for economically deprived and underserved communities. Although returns on traditional VC funds are considerably below their historic norms, those in the community development VC industry don't necessarily expect their industry to be strictly competitive on a dollar-per-dollar basis. However, the returns have been respectable. Meanwhile, a number of traditional, mainstream VC funds are starting to co-invest in a few of these early-stage enterprises.