The CEO Who’s Leveling the Playing Field Between Credit Unions and Big Banks
Cathie Mahon, who runs the National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions, emerges as a champion for grass-roots financial institutions.
For millions of working Americans, the 6,000-plus credit unions across the nation can serve as a paycheck-to-paycheck life preserver. Credit union tellers can refer customers with low balances to in-house financial literacy counselors, and their loan desks frequently offer the best rates, and lowest fees, in the country. A third of these institutions—almost 2,200—cater to low-income customers as standalone businesses or small chains.
What Cathie Mahon, chief executive officer of the National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions, found is that credit unions often use the same processing software as big banks but spend more on it. “Our smallest members pay more for software than personnel,” says Mahon, who leads a network of 235 CDCUs that share a mission of helping distressed communities. “They’re negotiating one-off contracts all the time.”