Meet the Economic Justice team
The Economic Justice team at Dēmos brings diverse expertise areas and perspectives to our critical mission of ensuring that people have power over the economic forces that shape their lives. Get to know each member and learn about what motivates them to do this work.
Meet Udochi Onwubiko, Director of Economic Justice
What spurred your interest in Economic Justice work?
Growing up as part of an immigrant family in the Deep South, I witnessed the multigenerational poverty as well as the pervasive and persistent racism that impacted my community. I saw how these things were intrinsically linked and felt that large scale change in how our economy works was vital to improving people’s lives.
What excites you about doing this work at Dēmos? What do you hope your team will be able to achieve?
Here at Dēmos we’re focused on systems change. We’re centering racial justice. We’re thinking and doing. We’re committed to improving outcomes for people who have been systematically excluded and working towards power shifts and systems changes that allow all communities to thrive. As a leader, being able to build a team that has strong expertise and deep commitment to the work is incredibly exciting, and I am looking forward to what we can accomplish together.
Meet Eliana Golding, Associate Director, Budget and Tax Policy
What spurred your interest in Economic Justice work generally and budget and tax policy specifically?
I grew up in and have sought out communities that place explicit value on collective care and community stewardship. Throughout my career working in immigrant rights, tenant organizing, and local housing and tax policy, I have seen how systems built on racism and classism prevent us from building a society informed by the idea of collective care. The dehumanizing impact of those racist and classist systems is what drives my commitment to economic justice work.
What excites you about doing this work at Dēmos? What do you hope your team will be able to achieve?
Every day, the way governments collect and distribute resources profoundly affects families and communities. Choices about investing in schools, health care, childcare, and other services can either help create opportunity and prosperity for people or hold them back. I believe those policies should demonstrate a commitment to collective responsibility and care. I am excited to join a team of brilliant thinkers and doers who are committed to reshaping our systems in pursuit of a more economically just society. Through our work, I hope we can shape the national conversation around the value of more just resource allocation and wealth redistribution.
Meet Nick Wertsch, Associate Director, Workplace Justice
What spurred your interest in Economic Justice work generally and workplace justice specifically?
My interest in economic and workplace justice is rooted in where I'm from — I grew up on the dividing line of St. Louis, MO, one of the most racially and economically segregated cities in the country. It was impossible to ignore the long history and deep-rooted injustices that shaped my hometown. But I also saw the power and resilience a community can generate when we care for each other and organize around that idea. Those lessons led me to community and worker organizing as a means for broader change, and specifically towards the workplace as the space where so much of that change must happen in order to realize a more just and equitable economy.
What excites you about doing this work at Dēmos? What do you hope your team will be able to achieve?
Dēmos has already made the connection between economic justice, racial justice, and democracy in how it approaches these issues, and I’m excited to be able to lean in and build on that organizational legacy. That kind of holistic thinking is often missing in other movement spaces, and I am thrilled to learn from and work alongside so many incredible folks. This team is particularly well-positioned to be creative in how we think about these issues, to collaborate with others who can elevate our work, and to think strategically about how we can secure the policies that will make a difference on the ground.
Meet Lydia Casmier Anway, Associate Director, Financial Justice
What spurred your interest in Economic Justice work generally and financial justice specifically?
My lived experience. My father works in an Amazon warehouse with no benefits and my mother has a disability and relies on family for caregiving. I have firsthand experience navigating systemic barriers to economic security and mobility, so I am driven to dismantling them on a personal and professional level.
What excites you about doing this work at Dēmos? What do you hope your team will be able to achieve?
I am thrilled to be joining an organization that is courageous and bold in the pursuit of policy, systemic, and narrative change. I hope that my team will exercise imagination and curiosity as we explore and elevate solutions to some of our nation’s deepest-rooted injustices.
Meet Daniella Zessoules, Senior Policy Analyst
What spurred your interest in Economic Justice work?
Much of my interest in economic justice stems from personal exposure to and interaction with public policy decisions. Policy decisions enabled me to pursue higher education without being burdened by insurmountable debt just as different policy decisions took away my ability to visit family in Venezuela for over a decade. This continued exposure has fueled a deep-seated and unshakable frustration with the status quo that inspired me to join the fight for a more equitable economy. While the seed to pursue a career in economic justice may have been planted many years ago, it’s my peers, my family, my community, mentors, and teachers who opened the door and continue to pull me into the spaces that enable my pursuit of economic justice as a career and continual practice.
What excites you about doing this work at Dēmos? What do you hope your team will be able to achieve?
The current political moment requires an uncompromising commitment to bold, structural policy change that dismantles economic systems predicated on extraction, violence and harm of communities of color. Dēmos’ unabashed and reinvigorated vision for building power for Black and brown communities is working to do just that. Working here with such an organizational orientation while in community with experts and thought partners who are committed to realizing the change our country needs inspires me to put that vision into practice.
Meet Candace Milner, Senior Policy Analyst
What spurred your interest in Economic Justice work generally and financial justice specifically?
Growing up in a Black working-class community and going on to work in many low-wage jobs, I realized early in my working life that I was not going to be able to simply save my way out of poverty. As I learned more about the ways Black and Brown communities are spending, saving, and investing their money, it was clear to me that there are not enough tools for us to build or sustain financial security and generational wealth and that the systems that exist are actually working against us. My interest in financial justice stems from the deep belief that generational wealth should not only be a reality for the rich but a pillar of all our communities.
What excites you about doing this work at Dēmos? What do you hope your team will be able to achieve?
Doing this work at Dēmos will afford me the chance to work with thought leaders who are unapologetically committed to race-forward, community-first solutions. I hope our team is able to secure relief from the discriminatory financial systems many communities must currently navigate and to shift power to sustainably create systems that give Black and Brown communities the opportunity to thrive financially.
