IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedhwp/wp-03-10.html

The importance of check-cashing businesses to the unbanked: racial/ethnic differences

Author

Listed:
  • William H. Greene
  • Sherrie L. W. Rhine
  • Maude Toussaint-Comeau

Abstract

The roughly 9.5 percent of all U.S. families that are without some type of transaction account (unbanked) are disproportionately represented by minorities. The unbanked often must rely on alternative ways to carry out basic financial transactions such as cashing payroll checks and paying bills. This study analyzes unique survey data and finds that a consumer's decision to patronize check-cashing businesses is jointly made with the decision to be unbanked. For the unbanked, these businesses are an important source for financial services. Attributes that contribute to these decisions, however, vary for each racial/ethnic group. Latent preference effects are also observed to influence this joint decision for Blacks and Hispanics. These findings may explain in part why the provisions of the Debt Collection Improvement Act (DCIA) of 1996 have not been more successful in bringing unbanked federal benefits recipients into the financial mainstream. ; Consumer participation in mainstream financial markets can improve their ability to build assets and create wealth, protect them from theft and discriminatory, predatory or unsavory lending practices, and may promote economic stability and vitality in the communities where they reside. By more fully understanding a consumer's financial decisions, policies can be better directed to improve the effectiveness of legislation such as the DCIA of 1996 in encouraging mainstream financial market participation.

Suggested Citation

  • William H. Greene & Sherrie L. W. Rhine & Maude Toussaint-Comeau, 2003. "The importance of check-cashing businesses to the unbanked: racial/ethnic differences," Working Paper Series WP-03-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedhwp:wp-03-10
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.chicagofed.org/digital_assets/publications/working_papers/2003/wp2003-10.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. William H. Greene, 1998. "Gender Economics Courses in Liberal Arts Colleges: Further Results," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(4), pages 291-300, January.
    2. Jong-Il Kim & Lawrence J. Lau, 1996. "The sources of Asian Pacific economic growth," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 29(s1), pages 448-454, April.
    3. Constance R. Dunham, 2001. "The role of banks and nonbanks in serving low- and moderate income communities," Proceedings 903, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    4. Edward Simpson Prescott & Daniel D. Tatar, 1999. "Means of payment, the unbanked, and EFT '99," Economic Quarterly, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, issue Fall, pages 49-70.
    5. Joseph J. Doyle & Jose A. Lopez & Marc R. Saidenberg, 1998. "How effective is lifeline banking in assisting the 'unbanked'?," Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 4(Jun).
    6. Arthur B. Kennickell & Martha Starr-McCluer & Annika E. Sunden, 1997. "Family Finance in the U.S.: Recent Evidence from the Survey of Consumer Finances," Federal Reserve Bulletin, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), vol. 83(1), pages .1-24, January.
    7. William H. Greene & Jeanne M. Hogarth & Sherrie L. W. Rhine & Maude Toussaint-Comeau, 2001. "The role of alternative financial service providers in serving LMI neighborhoods," Proceedings 785, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Edward Simpson Prescott & Daniel D. Tatar, 1999. "Means of payment, the unbanked, and EFT '99," Economic Quarterly, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, issue Fall, pages 49-70.
    2. Jeanne M. Hogarth & Chris E. Anguelov & Jinkook Lee, 2003. "Why Households Don’t Have Checking Accounts," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 17(1), pages 75-94, February.
    3. Uwe Jirjahn & Jens Mohrenweiser & Stephen C Smith, 2022. "Works councils and workplace health promotion in Germany," Economic and Industrial Democracy, Department of Economic History, Uppsala University, Sweden, vol. 43(3), pages 1059-1094, August.
    4. Claire Dujardin & Florence Goffette-Nagot, 2009. "Does public housing occupancy increase unemployment?," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 9(6), pages 823-851, November.
    5. Jeremy Berkowitz & Richard Hines, 1998. "Bankruptcy exemptions and the market for mortgage loans," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 1998-07, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    6. Sorgner, Alina & Fritsch, Michael, 2013. "Stepping Forward: Personality Traits, Choice of Profession, and the Decision to Become Self-Employed," VfS Annual Conference 2013 (Duesseldorf): Competition Policy and Regulation in a Global Economic Order 79768, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    7. Florence Goffette-Nagot & Claire Dujardin, 2005. "Neighborhood effects, public housing and unemployment in France," Working Papers 0505, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    8. Joan Costa-Font & Mireia Jofre-Bonet, 2013. "Anorexia, Body Image and Peer Effects: Evidence from a Sample of European Women," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 80(317), pages 44-64, January.
    9. Pérez, Carlos & Martín-Román, Ángel & Moral, Alfonso, 2020. "Two decades of the complementary leisure effect in Spain," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 15(C).
    10. Jun, Zhang, 2003. "Investment, investment efficiency, and economic growth in China," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(5), pages 713-734, October.
    11. Huang, Qianqian & Jiang, Feng & Lie, Erik & Yang, Ke, 2014. "The role of investment banker directors in M&A," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(2), pages 269-286.
    12. Julio J. Rotemberg, 2007. "Minimally altruistic wages and unemployment in a matching model," Working Papers 07-5, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    13. Baxter, Marianne, 2002. "Social Security as a financial asset: gender-specific risks and returns," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 35-52, March.
    14. Lanjouw, J.O., 1997. "The Introduction of Pharmaceutical Product Patents in India: "Heartless Exploitation of the Poor and Suffering"?," Papers 775, Yale - Economic Growth Center.
    15. Sang Lee, 2008. "Market liberalization and ownership status of incumbent telecom enterprises: global evidence from the telecom sector," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 12(30), pages 1-10.
    16. Mozumder, Pallab & Raheem, Nejem & Talberth, John & Berrens, Robert P., 2008. "Investigating intended evacuation from wildfires in the wildland-urban interface: Application of a bivariate probit model," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(6), pages 415-423, August.
    17. Bernardino Adao & Andre C. Silva, 2017. "Sub-optimality of the Friedman rule with distorting taxes," Nova SBE Working Paper Series wp623, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Nova School of Business and Economics.
    18. Tom Krebs & Moritz Kuhn & Mark L. J. Wright, 2015. "Human Capital Risk, Contract Enforcement, and the Macroeconomy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(11), pages 3223-3272, November.
    19. Irina A. Telyukova, 2013. "Household Need for Liquidity and the Credit Card Debt Puzzle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 80(3), pages 1148-1177.
    20. Zhang, Xiaohui & Zhao, Xueyan & Harris, Anthony, 2009. "Chronic diseases and labour force participation in Australia," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 91-108, January.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fip:fedhwp:wp-03-10. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lauren Wiese (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbchus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.