Why can Amazon get almost anything in the world to your door faster than your bank can move money? It’s because the Federal Reserve allows banks to sit on your money and profit from that.
Delays of a few days don’t mean much for people who always have a financial cushion. But for the half of Americans living paycheck to paycheck, it costs tens of billions a year. This is why there are more payday lenders and check cashers than McDonalds and Starbucks combined. This is despite the fact that the law actually requires banks to make your money available much faster—it’s just not enforced.
