Several members of the U.S. House of Representatives are seeking to expand postal banking pilot programs, an initiative designed to extend banking services to underbanked Americans while revitalizing the Postal Service.
A group of 33 lawmakers, led by Reps. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), sent a letter to the leaders of the House Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government seeking support for these pilot programs.
“We write to strongly encourage you to include the below language supporting postal non-bank financial services pilot programs in the Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) House Financial Services and General Government Appropriations (FSGG) Bill. These pilot programs would help Americans, particularly people of color, lacking access to mainstream financial services,” the lawmakers wrote.
Millions of Americans live in an area without immediate access to a brick-and-mortar bank. In a 2017 study, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation found that some 63 million adults are considered underbanked. It found that 90 percent of zip codes lacking a bank or credit union are in rural areas. Bank branches are also sparse in low-income urban communities. The lawmakers said that roughly 46 percent of Latino and 49 percent of African American households are underbanked.
Further, reports by the USPS Office of Inspector General found that the Postal Service is well-suited to bring basic nonbank financial services to underbanked communities. This pilot program would establish expanded banking and financial services in post offices.
“The pandemic has underscored once again postal workers’ deep commitment to serving our communities. But we know that millions still lack access to affordable and reliable financial services. Now’s the time to expand postal financial services, and the pilots called for in this letter are a critical first step. Postal workers look forward to this important way to better serve the public,” American Postal Workers Union President Mark Dimondstein said.
Postal banking expansion is endorsed by many organizations, including the American Postal Workers Union, Save the Post Office Coalition, American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), AFL-CIO, Public Citizen, Consumer Action, Communications Workers of America, SEIU, Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, Center for Popular Democracy, Patriotic Millionaires, Take on Wall Street, Sierra Club, Common Cause, Americans for Financial Reform, Social Security Works, Alliance for Retired Americans, and the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association (NARFE), among others.
“Piloting non-bank financial services at the post office would save working families in these communities thousands of dollars and would ultimately bring in over a billion dollars in revenue for the postal service every year,” Porter McConnell of the Save the Post Office Coalition said.