Consumers obviously didn t like ATM fees, and neither do their state representatives. The legal battles began. Connecticut and Iowa enacted bans which seem to be surviving court challenges. San Francisco issued a city-wide ban which was subsequently struck down. In the meanwhile, the PIRGs provide some relief.
Banks are the quintessential nameless, faceless bulwarks of capitalism.
With no pretense at equality, capitalism allows some people to have more cash ludicrously more cash than other people. Big banks seem to be catering, increasingly, towards bigger wallets, perhaps because that s where they can gain the most money. Yet there is something repulsive, unsurprisingly, in hearing a bank tell its customers that it doesn t want them. The suggestion that 12 million families cannot afford bank accounts is unthinkable. Without a bank account, a person can t hold her own.