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Summary
Summary
An urgent, absorbing exposé--why Americans are fleeing our broken banking system in growing numbers, and how alternatives are rushing in to do what banks once did
What do an undocumented immigrant in the South Bronx, a high-net-worth entrepreneur, and a twenty-something graduate student have in common? All three are victims of our dysfunctional mainstream bank and credit system. Today nearly half of all Americans live from paycheck to paycheck, and income volatility has doubled over the past thirty years. Banks, with their high monthly fees and overdraft charges, are gouging their low- and middle-income customers, while servingonly the wealthiest Americans.
Lisa Servon delivers a stunning indictment of America's banks, together with eye-opening dispatches from inside a range of banking alternatives that have sprung up to fill the void. She works as a teller at RiteCheck, a check-cashing business in the South Bronx, and as a payday lender in Oakland. She looks closely at the workings of a tanda , an informal lending club. And she delivers fascinating, hopeful portraits of the entrepreneurs reacting to the unbanking of America by designing systems to creatively serve many of us. Banks were once essential pillars of our lives; now we can no longer count on them to do right by us.
"Required reading for fans of muckraking authors like Barbara Ehrenreich, this fascinating look at the future of money management insists that the 'unbanked' are a sector deserving of respect and solid options." -- Publishers Weekly , starred review
Author Notes
LISA SERVON is Professor of City and Regional Planning at the University of Pennsylvania and a former dean of the New School. Her work on consumer financial services has been published in the Wall Street Journal , the Atlantic online, and The New Yorker online, among many others. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
The failure of banks to meet the needs of the 99%-and the cottage industries filling the gap-are thoughtfully explored in this startling and absorbing exposé from Servon, a professor of city and regional planning at the University of Pennsylvania. As she describes, commercial banks now cater largely to the wealthy, and more Americans are turning to alternative financial services, including check cashers, payday lenders, and a variety of informal arrangements. To better understand the options available, Servon took jobs at RiteCheck, a check-cashing establishment in the South Bronx, and Check Center, a payday lender in Oakland, Calif. Surprisingly, she concludes that the seemingly predatory "shadow" banking system may simply be a reasonable (if inconsistently regulated) approach to customer demand. In layperson-accessible language, Servon explains the effects of banking regulations-both recent and historical-and of technological innovations in consumer financial services. Most notable is the breadth of people she finds who have removed themselves, or been removed, from the world of conventional banking, including those with chronically low income, students, and entrepreneurs. Required reading for fans of muckraking authors like Barbara Ehrenreich, this fascinating look at the future of money management insists that the ever-growing number of the "unbanked" are a sector deserving of respect and solid options. Agent: Adam Eaglin, Cheney Literary. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Servon has been writing and teaching about financial and banking industries for years. In this, her breakout book, she focuses on why mid-to-lower-income Americans have moved away from banks and credit cards to such alternative financial services as payday lenders. Servon contrasts the high fees and penalties and daunting bureaucracy at banks with the personal service, transparent fee structures, and accessibility of alternative services. To get closer to her subject, she took jobs at a check-cashing store in the South Bronx and a payday lender in Oakland. Drawing on her conversations with customers, coworkers, business owners, and financial-services entrepreneurs, Servon explains how traditional banking has changed, creating the opportunity for innovation in the marketplace. She then argues for a financial-rights movement akin to the safe-food movement to protect and meet the needs of the changing American population and those coping with financial instability. Servon presents a well-researched and easily accessible book on an important subject that affects everyone, a work that will certainly appeal to readers interested in business, personal finance, and consumer behavior.--Kaplan, Dan Copyright 2016 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Servon (city & regional planning, Univ. of Pennsylvania) provides insight into why many Americans, such as the working poor, immigrant and minority groups, millennials, and even entrepreneurs with ample funds, have not been served properly by traditional banks. The author, a recognized expert in the field of banking alternatives, as evidenced by her education and bylines in major publications, such as the New York Times, shows how individuals have used alternative banking methods, such as lending clubs. Servon spent large amounts of time working as a teller at a South Bronx check-cashing business and an Oakland payday lender while researching this book. This book will appeal to many different readers. Servon is an engaging writer who relates stories of these new business owners, their employees, customers, and innovations with a personal touch. VERDICT This well-written book offers a fascinating read. [See Prepub Alert, 7/11/16.]-Caroline Geck, -Somerset, NJ © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
| Introduction: We're All Underbanked | p. xi |
| Chapter 1 Where Everybody Knows Your Name | p. 1 |
| Chapter 2 Bankonomics, or How Banking Changed and Most of Us Lost Out | p. 25 |
| Chapter 3 The New Middle Class | p. 47 |
| Chapter 4 The Credit Trap: "Bad Debt" And Real Life | p. 63 |
| Chapter 5 Payday Loans: Making the Best of Poor Options | p. 77 |
| Chapter 6 Living in the Minus: The Millennial Perspective | p. 103 |
| Chapter 7 Borrowing and Saving Under the Radar | p. 121 |
| Chapter 8 Inside the Innovators | p. 143 |
| Chapter 9 Rejecting the New Normal | p. 165 |
| Author's Note | p. 179 |
| Acknowledgments | p. 185 |
| Notes | p. 191 |
| Bibliography | p. 227 |
| Index | p. 241 |