RCG - Classism

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by Miana Bryant3 views·Updated Jun 22, 2022
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  1. Hey everybody. It's me anna. I'm here for my photo
  2. voice presentation to discuss classism in Prince George's County.
  3. Um, I'm gonna kind of highlight specifically southern Maryland.
  4. Southern Prince George's County, which is where I live,
  5. which is where I took majority of these pictures.
  6. Uh, so yeah,
  7. my presentation is going to highlight check cashing in Maryland.
  8. Specifically in Prince George's County.
  9. Check cashing,
  10. which is different from payday lenders typically allow customers to pay bills,
  11. get money orders, wire money, um, pay utility than things of that nature,
  12. which makes them particularly popular in low income and immigrant areas.
  13. Check cashiers
  14. Proliferated after the 1980s when bank deregulation deregulation prompted
  15. a wave of consolidation that closed many banks,
  16. particularly in low-income neighborhoods.
  17. As of June there are roughly 500 licensed check
  18. cashing businesses in Maryland with older 85% being in highly
  19. populated Hispanic or african american areas.
  20. Uh, so this is the check cashing place that is roughly 10 minutes from my house.
  21. Um, it's a check cashing along with a king's tobacco shop.
  22. And this for me definitely highlights
  23. Classism specifically in my community because
  24. there are no check cashing places in towns such as Annapolis,
  25. Bowie Rockville.
  26. But that's the places in Maryland that have
  27. much higher rates of white families and white households
  28. do not have anywhere.
  29. Nearly as many check cashing places, if any,
  30. you have much more options of seeing the truest saying the bank of America.
  31. Um Single wells Fargo are seeing an actual true bank versus financial
  32. support systems and things of that nature.
  33. So yeah, Check cashing is purely based on the neighborhoods where it's gonna be,
  34. who's all going to be using it
  35. and how often it will be used based on the people that live near it.
  36. So according to data from the national
  37. survey on unbanked and underbanked households,
  38. um
  39. 16 of black Americans do not own a bank
  40. account from a traditional bank or credit union,
  41. while about 14% of Hispanic households do not own a bank account either.
  42. However,
  43. that is a stark contrast to Whiten Asian households
  44. with about 797% of households owning a bank account.
  45. Uh The largest and
  46. main difference between white neighborhoods
  47. and african american neighborhoods is
  48. the ability to maintain finances within the bank account.
  49. So as a lot of us know in order to maintain
  50. a bank account at least a debit account or checking account,
  51. you have to be able to have a certain amount of money, There are maintenance fees,
  52. there are transactional fees and the number one thing
  53. is that there's overdraft fees for maintaining a bank account
  54. for a lot of people that are living paycheck to paycheck that live in low
  55. income areas or that are depending on benefits
  56. from the government benefits from the state.
  57. It's much easier and much less of a hassle to be able to just take the check to a
  58. check cashing place and not necessarily have to maintain
  59. a bank account or pay all of those fees.
  60. Um During a survey by the F. D. I. C.
  61. Among all household survey,
  62. more than half or roughly 52% of unbanked households cited,
  63. They do not have enough money to keep in an
  64. account as the reason for not having account and 34% said
  65. it was the sole main reason for not having one because
  66. they weren't able to keep enough money in the account.
  67. Um
  68. For example, in majority white neighborhoods,
  69. the average minimum balance needed to avoid a monthly
  70. fee for a bank account is roughly $625,
  71. which is about 28% of the median community income.
  72. While in comparison and majority black neighborhoods,
  73. the minimum monthly balance with $870 or 60% of the median community income.
  74. So as I've kind of covered. The main thing is that check cashing and
  75. places like this,
  76. pay lenders and things like that are mainly pushed
  77. on low income areas and essentially black households.
  78. This is another check cashing place that is located um
  79. I would say about 30 minutes from my house.
  80. Um And this is getting further and further into the city, further and further into D.
  81. C. And further and further away from kind of like Montgomery county
  82. and those counties that have a higher white
  83. household population.
  84. Um As far as it comes to
  85. check cashing,
  86. the main issue that people have with check cashing is the interest um definitely
  87. the interest and how much money you end up losing because when people do take
  88. their checks to check cashing the actual check cashing place is allowed to take a
  89. certain percentage of that money from the check before giving you the money back.
  90. So that definitely kind of adds to people living paycheck to paycheck.
  91. Um, in a different, in addition,
  92. it's definitely more of a short term answer that
  93. people are forcing to make a long term answer.
  94. There are people that have never had a bank account
  95. and have been using check cashing essentially for generations,
  96. which definitely kind of
  97. aides to the instability with finances,
  98. The instability with financial education.
  99. Uh,
  100. so consumer advocates are more critical of payday lenders and check cashing places
  101. because they charge such high interest rates on customers paycheck,
  102. even though Maryland, state of Maryland allows
  103. pay lending and check cashes
  104. to do this,
  105. and they actually have an interest rate cap which
  106. is a little bit lower than most states,
  107. but there's still a high interest rate that most people would not face if
  108. any people would face going to a bank or using an actual bank account.
  109. Um Consumer advocates also criticized check casher as
  110. part of the problem in low income neighborhoods,
  111. saying that they exploit residents by charging
  112. high fees and perpetuate poor financial habits,
  113. including a lack of financial education.
  114. Um, so this entire situation is just the high density of
  115. cashiers and check cashing places in black areas in black
  116. households has definitely highlighted the need for better financial education.
  117. So people become more financially stable and understand the
  118. role of bank accounts and establishing credit securing loans,
  119. saving money.
  120. But this also aids to the need and requirement
  121. for a decrease in the racial wealth gap.
  122. And for just families,
  123. low income families to have more opportunities to
  124. have more resources to have higher paying jobs.
  125. So that where they're not required to live paycheck to paycheck
  126. and not required to continue to use check cashing places.
  127. In my personal opinion, from what I see in my community, check cashing places are
  128. definitely one of the institutes that are built and created to
  129. continue the longevity of African american being inferior and being in the
  130. low income neighborhood necessarily because it does not at all provide
  131. any way for people to grow for people to save money,
  132. for people to be able to invest for people to use their money for different things.
  133. It's purely just
  134. allowing people to get their paycheck, take money out of their paycheck and
  135. giving them the money that they have to just
  136. completely repeat the cycle over and over again.
  137. So yeah, this is definitely something that is highlighted in heavy,
  138. dense only in black and hispanic communities
  139. or areas that are heavily immigrant populated.
  140. These are the resources that I used.
  141. And yeah,
  142. thanks for watching