Tlaib, Ocasio-Cortez offer bill to create national public banking system
By Sylvan Lane - 10/30/20 02:48 PM EDT
Democratic Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) and Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) on Friday introduced a bill to create a federally chartered and supported public banking system.
Called the Public Banking Act, the bill would develop a system through which the Federal Reserve System and Treasury Department would recognize, offer grants and open credit facilities for nonprofit banks. These banks would be intended to compete with the commercial banking industry and would be barred from charging fees on checking or savings accounts, requiring minimum balances and levying interest rates of more than 15 percent.
Tlaib and Ocasio-Cortez said the bill is intended to expand access to financial services in areas where a large portion of the population is unable to afford conventional banking services. Nearly 30 percent of those without bank accounts cited an inability to meet minimum balance requirements as the main reason they did not use a bank, according to a June 2019 survey conducted by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., and nearly 49 percent said it was at least a contributing factor.
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https://thehill.com/policy/finance/523624-tlaib-ocasio-cortez-offer-bill-to-create-national-public-banking-system