I ws struck by the vast difference between the quake in Haiti and the quake in Chile. The reasons for this are obvious. Chile is more developed and its architecture is designed specifically to withstand high magnitude earthquakes. The same similarities exist in microfinance and economic development I think. Having worked in economic development (albeit from the fundraising side) in the U.S., I am interested in how microfinance can be adapted to be fully functional in the U.S. I know that scales are different. For example, a $500 loan may be a viable product for a rural entrepreneur in India, whereas the threshold for a microloan to make any sense in the U.S. may be $5,000. But what I have seen is that U.S. organizations (commonly known as community development financial institutions or CDFIs) tend to drift away from the smaller loans as they become more established. So basically, what I am curious about is, is there a means to adapt micro finance to the poor in a developed country like the U.S. where the economic infrastructure is not necessarily designed to promote it.