INTRODUCTION. Although seldom a mainstream topic in social work, the financial functioning of individuals and families plays a central role in well-being. The time is right to better understand the workings of low-income families, especially in this uncertain economic climate. Matched savings program called Individual Development Accounts (IDAs) provide a context for investigating how low-income parents save and accumulate assets. IDAs offer a unique means for a systematic study of the saving strategies used by low-income individuals and how the decision to save may create hardships for themselves and their families. There is still a pressing need for more research that can help clarify parental saving strategies, the factors facilitating or impeding saving, and the potential hardships low-income savers face. Of critical importance to the field is research that helps to better understand what sacrifices low-income parents make when they have made the decision to secure a better future for their families. METHODS. The sample is 150 savers from a statewide matched savings program. This study is a secondary analysis of telephone survey and administrative data. Bivariate and multivariate statistical tests were conducted to test six hypotheses. The variables of interest are saving strategies, saving supports, and hardships. RESULTS. Parents who have a history of saving use significantly more helpful saving strategies than respondents without a saving history. Parents who have a history of saving experience less severe hardship than parents who do not have a history of saving. Also, married parents experience fewer hardships than non-married parents. Minority parents experience significantly less intense saving supports than non-minority parents. There was not a relationship between the number of helpful saving strategies and the age of the saver. A relationship was not found between the saver's age or number of children and the number of hardships experienced.

La ricerca focalizza l'attenzione sul disagio adulto. Il concetto di persona è riletto alla luce del clima definito (neo)moderno all'interno del quale l'uomo vive una difficoltà quotidiana nel riconoscere se stesso e il contesto a lui circostante. Le relazioni interpersonali subiscono questa pressione socio culturale la quale va pertanto analizzata e considerata. L'età adulta è l'ambito specifico della ricerca; in questa fase della vita maturità e saggezza sono elementi da declinare e rileggere in relazione ai limiti costitutivi la persona stessa: riconoscere e assumere i propri limiti è una prima operazione di maturità. I limiti e il disagio chiamano in causa la necessaria lettura interdisciplinare: medicina e pedagogia dialogano nell'interesse della persona sofferente; da questo dialogo nascono indicazioni concrete per una pratica corresponsabile sui piani biologico ed educativo. Si sostanzia in definitiva una pedagogia del disagio e della marginalità adulta quale risultato dello scambio epistemologico fra le due discipline. questa prospettiva postula interventi rinnovati nell'ambito del disagio adulto poiché il disagio e la sofferenza non sono sempre ascrivibili a questioni di natura patologica. La pedagogia oltre a riconoscere il ruolo delle altre discipline è altresì riconosciuta come scienza impegnata nell'educazione degli adulti in stato di disagio. / The research focuses on adult hardships. The concept of person is considered by the light of a climate defined (neo) modern in which man lives a daily difficulty in recognising both himself and the surrounding context. Interpersonal relationships are strongly influenced by this socio cultural pressure that needs to be considered and analysed. Adulthood is the specific field of the research. During this stage of life, maturity and wisdom are elements to be considered and analysed in relation to the constitutive limits of the person: the awareness and the acceptance of the limits represent a first act of maturity. The limits and hardships require an interdisciplinary understanding: medicine and pedagogy interact on behalf of the person in hardships; factual proposals derive from this interaction for a joint responsibility on a biological and educational level. It gains substance after all a pedagogy of the hardships and adult marginality as a result of an epistemological exchange between the two disciplines. This perspective requires renewed interventions in adult marginality because the hardships and suffering cannot be always ascribed to pathological matters. Pedagogy, besides recognising the role of the other disciplines, is considered as a science engaged in the education of adult people in hardships.