Financial Access without Expertise: Consumer Implications of the Credit Crisis

At a conference hosted by the Federal Bank of St.Louis and the RISE Foundation, Matt Fellowes discusses the lessons about consumers that can be drawn from the current housing crisis. He highlights the broad democratization of the financial services market that occurred in the 20th century, but finds that there was one, important exception: access to professional advice about financial service options.

Fellowes discusses several of the problems that have emerged from consumers lacking that financial service and the policy and market-based solutions needed to democratize access to it.