It’s not often that billionaire Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, the largest money-management firm in the world with more than $10 trillion in assets, offers a critique that resonates with working families.  Yet as ‘Mayor of Davos’ at the opening of the 56th Annual World Economic Forum in Davos Switzerland, Fink stood before the world’s most powerful elites and issued an unprecedented warning against capitalism.

While acknowledging that global capitalism has generated extraordinary wealth since the fall of the Berlin Wall, Fink warned that those gains have accrued to a far narrower share of people than any healthy society can sustain. He argued that prosperity cannot be measured solely by GDP growth or rising stock valuations, but by whether people can feel economic progress in their daily lives—whether they can build stable futures, afford necessities, and participate meaningfully in growth.

In Connecticut, state leaders often point to strong bond ratings, budget surpluses, and fiscal stability as evidence of success. Those metrics matter. But they are not the whole story. For many residents, the past several years have also meant rising housing costs, unaffordable childcare, strained public services, and an increasingly upside-down tax structure that places a heavier burden on working families than on those with the greatest wealth.

Last year, Republicans and the Trump Administration passed the 'One Big Beautiful Bill'—a tax gift that saved Connecticut’s top 1% over a billion dollars annually. Sold to the public as a middle-class tax cut, the bill overwhelmingly benefited corporations and the ultra-wealthy, through deep cuts to corporate tax rates, preferential treatment of capital income, and loopholes that reward wealth accumulation rather than work.

Economists estimate that tens of trillions of dollars that should have flowed to wages instead landed in the hands of the top one percent. Working families were left with temporary, modest tax relief, while the wealthiest Americans locked in permanent gains.

For states like Connecticut, this moment created a rare opportunity: to rebalance state tax policy, protect critical services, and offset the loss of federal support for healthcare, housing, and human services. Some states chose to act. Connecticut largely did not.

And when federal funds receded, the state lacked sufficient flexible resources to respond quickly and at scale. Legislators scrambled to assemble stopgap relief while families faced immediate consequences—higher heating costs, reduced benefits, delayed care, and housing instability.

Fink warned that capitalism must evolve to turn more people into “owners of growth,” not spectators. That challenge applies as much at the state level as it does globally. The question is not whether Connecticut’s finances are stronger on paper, but whether our economic system is delivering security and dignity for the people who make the state run.

Connecticut is wealthy by many measures—and deeply unequal by others. It can be both fiscally responsible and more responsive to human need. It can invest in communities while maintaining stability. Those are choices, not impossibilities.

If even leaders at Davos are acknowledging that today’s economic model is failing too many people, Connecticut should take that signal seriously. Bond ratings alone cannot be the measure of success. The real test is whether families can afford to live here, whether seniors can stay warm, whether workers can access healthcare, and whether growth is something people participate in—not merely watch from the sidelines.

The path forward is not about blame. It’s about priorities—and deciding what kind of prosperity Connecticut wants to build next.