[stevewepay]

This is a quote from Michael Lewis' The Big Short, I'll never forget it:

Obsessing over Household [Finance Corporation], he attended a lunch organized by a big Wall Street firm. The guest speaker was Herb Sandler, the CEO of a giant savings and loan called Golden West Financial Corporation. “Someone asked him if he believed in the free checking model,” recalls Eisman. “And he said, ‘Turn off your tape recorders.’ Everyone turned off their tape recorders. And he explained that they avoided free checking because it was really a tax on poor people — in the form of fines for overdrawing their checking accounts. And that banks that used it were really just banking on being able to rip off poor people even more than they could if they charged them for their checks.”

Eisman asked, “Are any regulators interested in this?”

“No,” said Sandler.

“That’s when I decided the system was really, ‘Fuck the poor.’”

[Touche]

> form of fines for overdrawing their checking accounts.

Why in the world shouldn't you be fined for overdrawing your checking account? A checking account is not a loan, am I wrong in thinking this quote is B.S.?

[hrehhf]

Because the bank should just deny the charge to the account instead, and have no fine. You are right that a checking account is not a loan--so the bank should not treat it as if it is!

[scintill76]

I'm not really in the know, but I'd guess "back in the day" it legitimately cost somebody something to deal with a cheque with a value greater than the balance of the account. Nowadays, it should be the same $0.0001 worth of computing/networking power which is already spent if it's a good cheque. I'd welcome corrections from someone who knows more, but I figure modern fees are just a way for the bank to extract money from people too harried to fight back. Perhaps some of it is legitimately used to subsidize general account maintenance, and maybe the banks are passing on a real cost specifically charged by a clearinghouse for bad debits -- but somewhere down the line, the bulk of it has to be lining someone's pocket.

If someone were attempting thousands of bad charges in a month, maybe they "deserve punishment" for abusing the system. What the fees do now is just taking money from people who already have little, and/or just lost track of their balance and made a small mistake that would have no bearing on anyone else if the bank didn't fine for it.

[selectodude]

The charge should be declined, no different than a credit card. Allowing it to go through and then charging usurious fees is wrong.

[geofft]

What is the purpose of a fine? Before we discuss further why one shouldn't be fined, can we make sure we agree on why one should?

Off the top of my head, I see "dissuading behavior that negatively impacts the bank", and that doesn't seem to justify a fine in this case, but maybe you're thinking of a rationale for a fine that I and maybe others are not thinking of.

[Ollinson]

Why not just deny the transaction if it can't be paid in full?

The bank isn't doing you any favors by letting you pay with money you don't have, they know they'll be getting that money back and then some.

[bedhead]

No, it's the same system that allows the lottery to exist. It's not "fuck the poor", it's "fuck the stupid" (alternatively, "fuck the bad-at-math"). If there's a high correlation, I don't think anyone is going to be terribly surprised, as uncomfortable as that may be.

I have been poor. I have also been the opposite. I have also been a bank employee, and a professional investor who studied security analysis by looking at banks. The feds have rightly come down on banks via recent regs about how to charge overdraft fees, because banks did in fact used to play bullshit games with how they charged fees. A lot of that has been fixed. But the uncomfortable truth is that the people who repeatedly fall victim to these fees these days are simply irresponsible. You might as well complain about the high price of parking/speeding tickets - every opportunity in the world is there to avoid it.

I'm sure this will get about 50 downvotes but whatever.

[danharaj]

There is a cognitive overhead to managing every predatory relationship. The poor have to deal with many, many predatory relationships all the fucking time. People make mistakes and extremely powerful people and institutions exploit them as much as they can when they do.

Good on you for being able to say that you were poor, in the past tense. I'm glad. I don't think people are stupid just because they stay poor. When you call people stupid because they suffer and can't catch their breath or get their affairs in order because human institutions are structured in the most hostile, alienating, predatory way they can get away with, you start seeing stupidity wherever you ought to see compassion and empathy.

[fideloper]

Sounds like victim blaming. To an extent you're right, but the situation is not at all this black and white (like anything in reality).

Take for example just the fact that it's easy to lose track of your current savings especially without ready access to the internet, a common situation for the low income.

[guelo]

Except that banks go through great lengths to make keeping track of your money as confusing as possible.