With 40 million unbanked and underbanked people across the nation, America reflects a tale of two nations: the haves and have-nots. In Atlanta, that disparity is particularly acute.
You have the most promising city for African-American entrepreneurship and small business ownership in the nation. You also have areas such as Vine City which, according to the FDIC, is the fifth-most unbanked area in America. Given that 47 percent of all employers now pull a credit report, one could argue the question now is not whether you have a public record, but what’s the status of your credit.
I see the unbanked and financial illiteracy issue as the civil rights issue of this generation. This time the issue is class, not race. Today, more people don’t have a bank account than didn’t have the right to vote in 1962 (26 million). There are more poor whites in America than poor anyone else. To quote civil rights icon Andrew Young, “To live in a system of free enterprise, and to not understand the rules of free enterprise, is the very definition of slavery.”
Increasingly, whether you are black, white, red, brown or yellow, all anyone wants to see is more green. When you deal with the issue of class, you get race for free. One is wrapped up and incorporated within the other.
The lack of having 40 million Americans fully vested and invested in the broader economic system means America is holding back its own national economic prosperity. It’s Atlanta’s problem, too.
In low-wealth urban and rural neighborhoods and even outside military installations, we find check cashers, next to payday lenders, next to rent-to-own stores, next to title lenders, next to liquor stores. All feed on low levels of hope and financial IQ. I use to believe this this targeting of the poor and low-wealth population was based on some form of discrimination. Now I know it’s not. It simply target marketing. These businesses are targeting a 500-credit score customer.
My vision is simple: Rob them of their customers.
At Operation HOPE, and at HOPE Inside at Ebenezer Baptist Church, we are moving people’s credit scores an average of 120 points over an 18-month period. Take Eboni Brown Robinson, who came into our offices with a credit score in the low 500s and walked out 10 months later with a score 74 points higher.
Young and I believe everyone should receive an electronic, debit-card-accessed bank account at birth, which would radically improve financial security, help the environment, create a direct government pipeline for federal, state and local benefit transfers, and single-handedly rock the nearly $500 billion alternative financial services industry back on its heels.
Finally, post-Great Recession in America, every child should receive mandatory financial literacy education in school — kindergarten through college. We can move Atlanta and our nation forward, building on the strong and positive legacy of civil rights justice, and into a new reality of silver rights empowerment for all.
John Hope Bryant is founder, chairman and CEO of Operation Hope, a nonprofit that teaches financial literacy.
