3c hapter - Index of

70 Locavesting
their homes to foreclosure, and neighborhoods fallen into blight.
Rather than work with homeowners, as the government urged, big
banks such as Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase contracted
with so- called foreclosure mills to speed through the process—
often illegally or without proper documentation (more or less
the same way the loans were originated). A government oversight
report warned that the sloppy handling could potentially call into
question the validity of 33 million mortgage loans. 12
Adding insult to injury, the biggest banks spent heavily throughout
2009 and 2010 to fend off or weaken regulations intended to
reign in risky or abusive behavior. Despite those efforts, various
reforms were passed, including the Credit Card Accountability,
Responsibility, and Disclosure (CARD) Act of 2009, which requires
more transparency and disclosure, including an opt- in requirement
for overdraft protection, and the Dodd- Frank bill in July 2010,
which created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to oversee
mortgages, credit cards, and other fi nancial products.
But don’t expect banking fees to come down as a result. In the
famous words of JPMorgan chief Jamie Dimon: “If you’re a restaurant
and you can’t charge for the soda, you’re going to charge
more for the burger.”
Well, if you’re a customer and you are served a lousy burger,
you don’t have to eat it.
Credit Union
Credit unions are nonprofi t fi nancial institutions owned by and operated
on behalf of their members, who typically share an affi liation,
such as an employer or trade. Like other cooperative businesses (see
Chapter 11), any excess revenue that does not go back into the business
is distributed to members in the form of better rates and fewer
fees—one reason they represent a good deal for consumers.
Move Your Money
That’s the idea behind the Move Your Money campaign, launched
at the end of 2009 by the Huffi ngton Post, with a clever video