Download Free Financial Services And Low Income Consumers Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online Financial Services And Low Income Consumers and write the review.

Access to capital and financial services is crucial for healthy communities. However, many impoverished individuals and neighborhoods are routinely ignored by mainstream financial institutions. This neglect led to the creation of community development financial institutions (CDFIs), which provide low-income communities with financial services and act as a conduit to conventional financial organizations and capital markets. Edited by Julia Sass Rubin, Financing Low-Income Communities brings together leading experts in the field to assess what we know about the challenges of bringing financial services and capital to poor communities, map out future lines of research, and propose policy reforms to make these efforts more effective. The contributors to Financing Low-Income Communities distill research on key topics related to community development finance. Daniel Schneider and Peter Tufano examine the obstacles that make saving and asset accumulation difficult for low-income households—such as the fact that tens of millions of low-income and minority adults don't have a bank account—and consider solutions, like making it easier for low-wage workers to enroll in 401(K) plans. Jeanne Hogarth, Jane Kolodinksy, and Marianne Hilgert review evidence showing that community-based financial education programs can be effective in changing families' saving and budgeting patterns. Lisa Servon proposes strategies for addressing the challenges facing the microenterprise field in the United States. Julia Sass Rubin discusses ways community loan and venture capital funds have adapted in response to the decreased availability of funding, and considers potential sources of new capital, such as state governments and public pension funds. Marva Williams explores the evolution and recent performance of community development banks and credit unions. Kathleen Engel and Patricia McCoy document the proliferation of predatory lenders, who market loans at onerous interest rates to financially vulnerable families and the devastating effects of such lending on communities—from increased crime to falling home values and lower tax revenues. Rachel Bratt reviews the policies and programs used to make rental and owned housing financially accessible. Rob Hollister proposes a framework for evaluating the contributions of community development financial institutions. Despite the many accomplishments of CDFIs over the last four decades, changing political and economic conditions make it imperative that they adapt in order to survive. Financing Low-Income Communities charts out new directions for public and private organizations which aim to end the financial exclusion of marginalized neighborhoods.
The financial crisis exposed unsavory results of interactions between low- and moderate-income households and alternative and mainstream financial institutions: overleveraged incomes, high cost for financial services, and lack of access to useful financial products that can cushion against economic instability. It revealed a financial services system that is not well designed to serve these households, leaving them without financial slack. Pivotal analysis, focusing on metropolitan Detroit's low- and moderate-income neighborhoods, examines household decision making processes, behaviors, and attitudes toward a full range of financial transactions during the subprime lending boom. The author advocates helping families seek financial stability in three primary ways: enhancing individuals' financial capability, using technology to promote access to financial products and services that meet their needs, and establishing strong protections for consumers.
The consumer financial services market has seen the increasing use and proliferation of mobile technology to access financial services and manage personal finances. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's Office of Financial Empowerment issued a Request for Information (RFI) to find out more about mobile financial services and how low-income and economically vulnerable consumers are using them. This book provides a description of mobile financial services, a discussion of the opportunities and risks, and key takeaways from the comments. Furthermore, this book considers the ability of mobile financial services to increase financial inclusion among the underserved by providing them access to the banking system, retaining them in safe and sustainable account relationships, and fostering financial empowerment to improve financial stability and fulfill financial goals.
A Fragile Balance examines strategies to promote emergency savings, especially among underserved households. Each chapter is by an expert contributor and proposes an innovative financial product or service designed to bolster emergency savings among low-asset families. This collection also offers readers insights into the role of emergency savings and mechanisms to facilitate savings behaviors, and raises critical questions of the scale, institutional capacity, sustainability, accessibility, and effectiveness of existing programs.
One in four American adults doesn’t have a bank account. Low-income families lack access to many of the basic financial services middle-class families take for granted and are particularly susceptible to financial emergencies, unemployment, loss of a home, and uninsured medical problems. Insufficient Funds explores how institutional constraints and individual decisions combine to produce this striking disparity and recommends policies to help alleviate the problem. Mainstream financial services are both less available and more expensive for low-income households. High fees, minimum-balance policies, and the relative scarcity of banks in poor neighborhoods are key factors. Michael Barr reports the results of an in-depth study of financial behavior in 1,000 low- and moderate-income families in metropolitan Detroit. He finds that most poor households have bank accounts, but combine use of mainstream services with alternative options such as money orders, pawnshops, and payday lenders. Barr suggests that a tax credit for banks serving primarily disadvantaged customers could facilitate greater equality in the private financial sector. Drawing on evidence from behavioral economics, Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir show that low-income individuals exhibit many of the same patterns and weaknesses in financial decision making as middle-class individuals and could benefit from many of the same financial aids. They argue that savings programs that automatically enroll participants and require them to actively opt out in order to leave the program could drastically increase savings ability. Ronald Mann demonstrates that significant changes in the credit market over the past fifteen years have allowed companies to expand credit to a larger share of low-income families. Mann calls for regulations on credit card companies that would require greater disclosure of actual interest rates and fees. Raphael Bostic and Kwan Lee find that while home ownership has risen dramatically over the past twenty years, elevated risks for low-income families—such as foreclosure—may well outweigh the benefits of owning a home. The authors ultimately argue that if we want to demand financial responsibility from low-income households, we have an obligation to assure that these families have access to the banking, credit, and savings institutions that are readily available to higher-income families. Insufficient Funds highlights where and how access is blocked and shows how government policy and individual decisions could combine to eliminate many of these barriers in the future.