01/19/2015 – A coalition of consumer organizations, financial reform groups, faith-based organizations and workers’ representatives – including the APWU and the other postal unions – announced the formation of the Campaign for Postal Banking on Jan. 19. The coalition is calling on the U.S. Postal Service to expand access to affordable financial services through its 31,000 neighborhood retail offices.
The launch of the campaign is timed to coincide with the celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and the release of a report titled State of the Dream 2015: Underbanked and Overcharged.
01/19/2015 – Expanding Low-Cost Financial Services through the United States Postal Service is a Way to Put More Money into the Pockets of Low-Wage Workers and to Provide Banking to Americans in Rural and Urban Areas with Few Banking Options
United for a Fair Economy, One of the Coalition’s Founding Members, Releases New Report On Martin Luther King’s Birthday, that Shows that Nearly 100 Million Poor and Working Class Americans Pay $89 Billion Each Year to Payday Lenders, Pawn Shops and Check Cashers
WASHINGTON – Financial reform groups, joined by postal unions and others from organized labor, announced today the creation of a national campaign to expand banking services. “The Campaign for Postal Banking” proposes to expand access to affordable financial services through the United States Postal Service’s 31,000 retail branches.
Today, 28 percent of U.S. households, representing 93 million people, do not have access to affordable financial products such as the ability to cash a check, transfer money or pay a bill at a reasonable fee. Americans who lack these services, what some call the “unbanked” or the “underbanked,” find that traditional banks are out of reach due to geography or because of high fees and other obstacles. Limited access drives millions to rely on costly, predatory services such as check cashing stores and payday lenders, trapping many in a cycle of debt. Some payday lenders charge as much as 400 percent in annual interest. The average low-wage worker using these “legal loan sharks” pays an incredible $2,400 per year in fees for these services.
“Much of the national debate has focused on how wages have lagged for working Americans in recent years,” said American Postal Workers Union President Mark Dimondstein. APWU is one of the coalition’s members. “As a society we need to find ways to boost wages and create and keep living wage jobs,” said Dimondstein. “We also need to find ways to cut costs for low-wage Americans. Postal banking is a way to cut costs and put money back into the pockets of people barely getting by.”
The APWU and other partner organizations that have formed the Campaign for Postal Banking find that the United States Postal Service (USPS) is in a unique position to provide basic, affordable, consumer-driven financial services to these underserved communities and individuals who live in what are often called “bank deserts.” The USPS has more storefronts than any other retailer. A third of the nation’s zip codes have access to a post office but lack a traditional bank.
A report released today by another one of the coalition partners, United for a Fair Economy, entitled Underbanked and Overcharged, makes the case for how postal banking will benefit the poor and low-wage workers.
A report released last year by USPS’ Inspector General called Providing Non-Banked Financial Services for the Underserved explains how an expansion of financial services would fill a great social need and strengthen the finances of the Postal Service.
USPS is not a latecomer to banking services. From 1911 to 1967, the U.S. Post Office offered savings deposit accounts and currently sells more money orders than any other institution. Anyone who goes to a postal window and pays with a debit card anywhere in the United States also is offered the option of getting cash back.
Postal systems around the world – including France, Italy, Japan, China, Brazil, India, and New Zealand offer financial services and play important roles in advancing financial inclusion and literacy.
Campaign for Postal Banking is a coalition of consumer, worker, financial reform, economic justice, community, civic, and faith-based organizations building a movement to inform and mobilize the public to call on the United States Postal Service to take the necessary steps to restore and expand postal banking at its branches across the country. Founding members include:
Alliance for Retired Americans
Americans for Financial Reform
American Postal Workers Union
Center for Study of Responsive Law
Coalition of Black Trade Unionists
Commonnomics
Essential Information
Interfaith Worker Justice
National Association of Letter Carriers
National People’s Action
National Postal Mail Handlers Union
National Rural Letter Carriers Association
Public Citizen
United for a Fair Economy
USAction
– See more at: http://www.apwu.org/news/press-release/new-coalition-%E2%80%98campaign-postal-banking%E2%80%99-launches-strong-support-financial-reform#sthash.QUikXqg5.dpuf
About time we got off the dime !
Bank Tellers are among the lowest paid employees in the country, as a group. Postal banking is not the answer to preserving middle class jobs. Would postal bank tellers be paid three times the national average or the same as the rest of the industry, minimum wage
I agree there is a huge market to provide banking services for under served communities, but I do not see it as the Postal Services’ new mission.
Even the idiot union leaders know the PO will never be privatized as there is no entity stupid enough to buy it, take it for free, or be paid enough to take it. Why are the union employees dumb enough to not only repeat it but to believe it? Well ~!~ y’all were not bright enough to see through the BS and voted for Obie. How has that worked out for you over the past 6 years? What has Obie and the Demonrats done for you?
YOU ARE A RIGHT WING CLOWN SALTY …… TAKE THE REPUBLICAN CLOWNS IN CONGRESS THAT CARES FOR THE RICHEST IN OUR SOCIETY AND COULD CARE LESS ABOUT THE WORKING AND MIDDLE CLASS ……
BY THE WAY PRESIDENT BARRACK OBAMA IS AN OUTSTANDING LEADER AND THANK GOD HE IS OUR PRESIDENT …. ITS THE RIGHT WING CLOWNS LIKE SENATOR MITCH MCCONNELL FROM KY WHOS BIG CLAIM TO FAME IS TO MAKE BARRACK A ONE TERM PRESIDENT ….THAT MY FRIEND IS THE PRIME EXAMPLE OF HOW ASSININE THE RIGHT WING CLOWNS IN CONGRESS ARE …. SALTY YOU ARE A PIECE OF WORK …. BY THE WAY IT HAS WORKED OUT WELL THE PAST 6 YERS ….. OBAMA AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY HAS HAD TO SAVETHIS COUNTRY FROM ANTHER DEPRESSION THAT WE WHERE EXTREMEY CLOSE TO IN 2008 AND …. A TWO FRONT WAR OF WHICH I PROUDLY SERVED IN OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM AGAINST AL QUIDA …. NOT THE PHONEY BUSH / CHAINEY IRAQ …. THANKS TO GEORGE BUSH …. NOW LITTLE BROTHER JEB IS LINING UP FOR A 3rd BUSH …. WE HAV HAD ENOUGH O THE BUSH’S AND THE REPUBLICANS IN GENERAL
THE POSTAL SERVICE PRIOBLEMS HAVE BEEN INTENSIFIED BY THE POLICIES OF THE RIGHT WING BASTARDS IN CONGRESS …. TAKE THAT TO THE BANK SALTY CAPTAIN ……. BY THE WAY THE LIMITED BANKING IDEA IS A GREAT THING FOR MANY PEOPLE IN SOCIETY AND THE POSTAL SERVICE AS WELL. …….. SO MAYBE THE BIG BANK REPUBLICANS CAN THINK ABOUT HOW POORLY THEY SERVE THE GENERAL PUBLIC … THATS WHY CREDIT UNIONS MAKE SINCE ….
What do you know? The people who do the work in the postal service are trying to find solutions to the mess that the people who don’t do any work created. Management’s strategy is to shut the doors and fire the workers; this is a plan to solve some of the problems. It makes me think that the USPS would be a lot better off without those clowns in Congress making decisions for it, and I KNOW it would be a lot better off if the clowns that are running it were removed. Most of them couldn’t run a lemonade stand if their lives depended on it.
Oh get real. No way the billionaire boys club is going to allow this sort of competition. Now as for the ability of the blithering idiots running the USPS to actually do this . . . are you kidding?
It’s a fantastic idea just like shipping wine and alcohol and firearms.. But unfortunately the powerful lobbyist control Republicans and since the House and Senate control both houses. It ain’t gonna happen!!! I mean C’mon, we have about 45 billion dollars surplus in a pension fund. Congress won’t give it back to us!!! Instead Rep. Ryan wanted to use our surplus to fund highway and bridge repairs last year.. And Megan Brennan isn’t gonna be any better when she becomes our next PMG… Megan was a light duty letter carrier in Lancaster, Pa. Then became a 204b and then supervisor.. Donahue was Postmaster and then POOM in Lancaster, Pa and then District Manager in Harrisburg , Pa and Central Pa cluster.. As he moved up the food chain, guess he was grooming and promoting??? You guessed it, Megan.. Megan is the epitome of piece of shit, worthless and Cuckkoo head management.. So the Post Office won’t change for the GOOD.. She will continue to keep putting the once great organization in the spiral death that we’re in.. And they say they owe the Veterans.. Well privatizing us doesn’t show their gratitude or respect to the men and women who gave these cowardly Republicans their freedom and great life and benefits. Wake up people!!! Republicans don’t give a shit about poor, middle and upper middle class Americans and small businesses.. Just the super rich and wealthy People and Corporations… It sickens me that Mitt Romney is planning to run for President again… Please vote for Hilliary Clinton!!! At least Democrats won’t privatize us.. God Bless!!!