WASHINGTON, D.C.— Stephen Hall, Legal Director and Securities Specialist, issued the following statement in connection with the release of a fact sheet titled “The CFPB Is Making Progress On Economic Racial Inequality, But There Is More To Do.”
“One of the most effective government agencies in the fight to close the economic racial divide is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The CFPB exists to protect individuals not only from predatory practices but also from racial discrimination in the financial markets, and we outline specific strides the agency has taken in our fact sheet.
“We continue to see profound racial economic inequality in the United States: Black Americans less likely to start small businesses and see them thrive; the unemployment rate for Black Americans is consistently higher than that for white Americans; and the wealth gap remains huge, as the typical Black household has just 10% of the wealth of the typical white household, a disparity that amounts to an astonishing wealth differential of $10.6 trillion.
“The CFPB has taken meaningful action to close these gaps including rulemaking, enforcement actions, and guidance to ensure fair treatment and equitable access to financial services. The CFPB has curtailed credit card penalty fees, overdraft fees, and non-sufficient funds fees. It has also proposed new consumer protections for PACE loans and Buy-Now, Pay-Later loans, both of which are disproportionately used by underrepresented communities and can be predatory in practice. The CFPB has also brought numerous enforcement actions against financial institutions for engaging in discriminatory conduct.
“However, there is more work to do. The CFPB should build upon these improvements by re-establishing standards that will curb abuses in the payday loan marketplace. For example, it should also adopt stronger rules to protect borrowers from abusive debt collection practices.”
The Fact Sheet is available here.
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