{"id":25743,"date":"2021-06-17T05:25:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-17T05:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=25743"},"modified":"2021-06-19T14:04:21","modified_gmt":"2021-06-19T14:04:21","slug":"postal-banking-could-provide-free-accounts-to-21-million-americans-who-dont-have-access-to-a-credit-union-or-community-bank","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/postal-banking-could-provide-free-accounts-to-21-million-americans-who-dont-have-access-to-a-credit-union-or-community-bank\/","title":{"rendered":"Postal banking could provide free accounts to 21 million Americans who don\u2019t have access to a credit union or community bank"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Terri Friedline<\/a>, University of Michigan<\/a><\/em> and Ameya Pawar<\/a>, University of Chicago<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Research Brief<\/a> is a short take about interesting academic work.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The big idea<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

About a quarter of census tracts with a post office don\u2019t have a community bank or credit union branch, suggesting postal banking could provide a financial lifeline to the millions of Americans<\/a> without a bank account, according to our new research<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

To reach this conclusion, we analyzed nationwide data on post office retail locations and bank and credit union branches<\/a>, as well as other demographic details in those areas. We wanted to understand how prevalent U.S. Postal Service locations are in areas underserved by banks and credit unions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our research examined data from U.S. census tracts<\/a>, which are districts created by the U.S. Census Bureau to geographically represent a neighborhood. The country has 73,057 tracts that vary in square mileage yet have a standardized average population of about 4,000 residents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We found that 69% of census tracts that have a post office lack a community bank \u2013 defined as having less than $10 billion in assets \u2013 while 75% don\u2019t have a credit union branch. And 24% have neither, affecting nearly 21 million people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The results varied widely from state to state. For example, in Arizona, 44% of tracts with a post office don\u2019t have a credit union or community bank, while in Nebraska that figure is only 4%. And we found that members of minority groups tend to be located disproportionately in areas that lack banking but do have a post office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n