Analyzing cross-sectional data from the National Medical Expenditure Survey (NMES), we find that the predicted probability of private insurance coverage for low-income individuals as a group fell dramatically from 1977 to 1987. The results of a decompositional technique show that the...

A notable feature of immigration into the U.S. is the high degree of spatial concentration of different immigrant groups. We ask the question whether residing in areas with a large proportion of a co-ethnic group influence the decision to own a home for Hispanics in the Chicago Metropolitan...

A critical challenge faced by educators, community leaders and policy makers is to bring financial literacy and consumer education effectively to their constituencies. Based on the qualitative evidence gleaned from focus groups, we take a pragmatic approach in proposing ways to deliver financial...

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 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...

This paper describes the characteristics of closed-system and open-system prepaid cards. Of particular interest is a class of open-system programs that offer a set of features similar to conventional deposit accounts using card-based payment applications. The benefits that open-system prepaid...