Student loan forgiveness advocates demand change from the Biden administration

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Deron Dalton | PennLive
“While income-driven repayment plans have allowed many student borrowers to make affordable payments, only a handful of borrowers have had their loans canceled through IDR,” Julia Barnard, Center for Responsible Lending’s student loan team co-lead and researcher recently said in a statement. “Decades of bad servicing, complicated paperwork and policy failures have broken borrowers’ faith in this program.

Lower-income and minority households assuming bigger debt risks

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Ben Popken | NBC News
“The economic impacts of this crisis highlight how communities of color are disproportionately harmed by structural inequities that exacerbate the impact of lower incomes, stagnant wages, lack of savings, lower credit scores, higher unemployment rates and a multitude of other issues,” said Ellen Harnick, executive vice president at the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonprofit consumer advocacy group.

Earned-Wage Access Products Face Fresh Scrutiny From CFPB, States

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Evan Weinberger | Bloomberg Law
Lawmakers in states that ban payday lending and have other strong consumer protections are likely to take notice of the CFPB’s potential new stance when considering how to treat pay advance products, said Yasmin Farahi, a senior policy counsel at the Center for Responsible Lending. “In some ways, those existing state consumer laws, which we think are how they should be regulated, could be viewed by these providers as a threat,” she said.

Regulate buy now/pay later. Now.

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Michael Calhoun | American Banker
Buy now/pay later products claim to offer consumers a risk-free way to boost their buying power, and maybe build credit and help others in the process. But beneath the shiny new veneer of technology and altruism could lurk the same predatory and abusive practices used by venture capitalists whose primary interest is profit, and who in the past have used similarly altruistic pretensions to exploit Black, Hispanic, military, essential and early-career employees, and other hardworking Americans.

Bank of America says it will cut overdraft fees this year.

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Lananh Nguyen | New York Times
“This is a very strong program that creates both limits, guardrails and the supports that people need to get through cash crunches that are going to continue to come to many working families,” Mike Calhoun, the president of the Center for Responsible Lending, an advocacy group that promotes financial fairness, said in an interview.

Younger generations pay the most in bank fees, report finds

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Khristopher J. Brooks | CBS News
Big U.S. banks have generated about $9 billion annually in revenue from overdraft, ATM and other fees in recent years, according to the Center for Responsible Lending, or CRL. The fees have become somewhat of a cash cow for banks over the past 20 years, some experts have said. Taylor Roberson, a fintech regulation expert at CRL, said Bankrate's survey confirms what researchers have known for years about millennials baring the brunt of banking fees.

Younger generations pay the most in bank fees, report finds

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Khristopher J Brooks | Wink News
Big U.S. banks have generated about $9 billion annually in revenue from overdrafts, ATMs and other fees in recent years, according to the Center for Responsible Lending, or CRL. The fees have become somewhat of a cash cow for banks over the past 20 years, some experts have said. Taylor Roberson, a fintech regulation expert at CRL, said Bankrate’s survey confirms what researchers have known for years about millennials baring the brunt of banking fees.

Biden extends student loan repayment pause three more months

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Jacob Fischler | The Pulse
Jaylon Herbin, outreach associate at the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL), praised this week’s decision by the Biden Administration. “We commend the President for safeguarding student loan borrowers at a time of profound economic uncertainty,” said Herbin. “The extension of the payment pause is a critical step toward restoring economic stability for borrowers and their families. We urge the Biden Administration to continue extending the payment pause until the pandemic and the associated economic crisis have been overcome.”

Tense Negotiations of Income-Driven Repayment Plans for Student Loans Continue

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Rebecca Kelliher | Diverse Education
“We know that 10% of discretionary income is quite high for many families,” said Julia Barnard, a researcher at the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonprofit organization that produces research and policy advocacy to protect consumers from predatory lending. On the campaign trail, President Biden proposed lowering that to 5% of a person's discretionary income, which could reduce a monthly loan payment by 50% or more for borrowers. That has not happened yet, however.