This paper describes the U.S. financial system’s response to the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina and examines how financial safety nets helped meet consumers’ needs in the aftermath of the storm. Overall, we find that consumers who hold deposit accounts at financial institutions are less vulnerable to financial disruptions than individuals who do not have either a checking or a savings account (the unbanked). The federal banking regulators’ and financial institutions’ responses to Hurricane Katrina, the financial vulnerability of unbanked families to this unexpected catastrophic event, and how the American Red Cross, FEMA, and the Gulf States’ relief efforts supplied financial assistance to Katrina’s victims are also addressed. Finally, we present several strategies that can be pursued to further safeguard the U.S. population and the financial community against extraordinary events.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.