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Discussion Paper
How Prevalent Were Racially Restrictive Covenants in 20th Century Philadelphia? A New Spatial Data Set Provides Answers
One of the tools used by early 20th century developers, builders, and white homeowners to prevent African Americans from accessing parts of the residential real estate market was the racially restrictive covenant. In this paper, we present a newly constructed spatial data set of properties in the city of Philadelphia with deeds that contained a racially restrictive covenant at any time from 1920 to 1932. To date, we have reviewed hundreds of thousands of property deeds and identified nearly 4,000 instances in which a racial covenant had been included in the deed. The covenanted properties ...
Discussion Paper
Payment cards and the unbanked: prospects and challenges.
On July 13-14, 2005, the Payment Cards Center of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia hosted a conference to better understand the ways in which electronic payment tools are being adapted to meet the financial needs of underserved consumers. This event, ?Payment Cards and the Unbanked: Prospects and Challenges,? brought together a range of perspectives from the banking industry, community development arena, academic community, and regulatory groups, as well as providers of new and emerging payment technologies. These participants examined the opportunities and challenges in providing ...
Discussion Paper
A tale of two vintages: credit limit management before and after the CARD act and Great Recession
This paper uses tradeline-level credit card data to examine initial credit limits and early credit limit increases before and after the Great Recession and implementation of the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act of 2009 (the CARD Act). I compare two vintages of credit card accounts, those opened in 2005 and 2011; I also follow each vintage for more than two years after the account opening. In general, I find that significantly less credit was extended to approved credit card applicants in 2011 than in 2005. Accounts in the 2011 vintage started out with lower ...
Discussion Paper
Meet People Where They Are: Building Formal Credit Using Informal Financial Traditions
The Consumer Finance Institute hosted a workshop in February 2019 featuring Jos Quionez, chief executive officer, and Elena Fairley, programs director, of Mission Asset Fund (MAF) to discuss MAF?s approach to helping its clients improve access to mainstream financial markets. MAF?s signature program, Lending Circles, adapts a traditional community-based financial tool known as a rotating savings and credit association (ROSCA) to help establish or expand credit reports for participants who may not be able to do so through traditional means. Lending Circles have served more than 10,000 clients ...
Discussion Paper
Proposed changes to Regulation Z: highlighting behaviors that affect credit costs
On June 29, 2007, the Payment Cards Center of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia sponsored a workshop led by Jeanne Hogarth, program manager, Consumer Education and Research Section, Division of Consumer and Community Affairs, Federal Reserve Board of Governors, to discuss the Board?s proposed changes to disclosure requirements for open-end credit, in particular, credit card billing statements and solicitation materials. Hogarth tied the proposed changes to her own research that identified certain behaviors most likely to affect the interest rates consumers pay for credit card ...
Discussion Paper
Exploring the use of anonymized consumer credit information to estimate economic conditions: an application of big data
The emergence of high-frequency administrative data and other big data offers an opportunity for improvements to economic forecasting models. This paper considers the potential advantages and limitations of using information contained in anonymized consumer credit reports for improving estimates of current and future economic conditions for various geographic areas and demographic markets. Aggregate consumer credit information is found to be correlated with macroeconomic variables such as gross domestic product, retail sales, and employment and can serve as leading indicators such that lagged ...
Discussion Paper
The role of electronic payments in disaster recovery: providing more than convenience
On May 3-4, 2006, the Payment Cards Center hosted a two-day conference titled ?The Role of Electronic Payments in Disaster Recovery: Providing More Than Convenience.? The event brought together participants from a range of groups, including financial institutions and other financial service providers; federal and state government and national relief agencies; and the bank regulatory community. Participants examined the lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina and considered how these experiences may be useful in identifying opportunities to further strengthen the financial system?s response to ...
Discussion Paper
Reverse Mortgage Retrospective: How Recent Policy Changes Affected Government-Insured Reverse Mortgage Originations and Performance
This discussion paper analyzes the outcomes of recent policy reforms to the federally insured reverse mortgage program. Prior to these reforms, more than one out of 10 older adults with a Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) was reported to be in default on the loan for failure to pay property taxes or homeowner’s insurance payments. We study the effect of two major types of policy reforms: one that restricted the amount of funds available to a borrower, and the other that introduced underwriting requirements through a financial assessment for the first time in the program’s history. ...
Discussion Paper
Driving positive behavior change through education and motivation: summary of a PayPerks workshop
Start-up firm PayPerks has developed a financial capability and rewards platform that combines online education with sweepstakes-based incentives. PayPerks? initial emphasis has been on improving the understanding and use of prepaid cards among individuals with little prior experience using payment cards. Participants can earn points in a variety of ways, including taking short, self-directed tutorials on prepaid card use. Every month, those points become chances to win cash prizes in sweepstakes drawings. PayPerks co-founders facilitated a Payment Cards Center workshop where they ...
Discussion Paper
Small business use of credit cards in the U.S. market
America?s small businesses have adopted credit cards as both a payment method and a borrowing vehicle. The segment also uses other payment card products, including debit, charge, and prepaid cards. The dollar volume of spending with cards designed for small businesses increased by 230 percent over the five-year period from 2003-2008. But the recession of 2007-2009 and contemporaneous changes in the regulatory environment had effects on both the supply to and demand of small businesses with respect to credit cards. To obtain an update on these issues, the Payment Cards Center hosted a workshop ...