Americans for Financial Reform

Americans for Financial Reform is a group that is working for reform in the banking and financial system. It describes itself as "a coalition of more than 250 national, state and local consumer, labor, investor, civil rights, community, small business, and senior citizen organizations that have come together to spearhead a campaign for real reform. Together, we are fighting for a banking and financial system based on accountability, fairness and security. The reckless and greedy behavior of big Wall Street banks caused a financial crisis that is costing us millions of jobs, billions of dollars in taxpayer funded bailouts, and trillions of dollars in lost homes and lost savings."

Reforms they want

From their website, reforms they are pushing for:

• Fair rules of the road for consumers, and a strong, effective Consumer Financial Protection Agency to set basic safety standards and protect families - and the market as a whole - from loans designed to trick and trap customers.
• A banking system that helps people buy and stay in their homes and invests in communities and businesses to create good jobs and strong neighborhoods.
• An end to big bank bailouts and megabanks that are "too big to fail."
• Transparency for all financial products and markets, and an end to the casino economy, so that Wall street can't keep making "heads they win, tails we lose" bets with our money.
• Executive compensation that rewards long-term value creation, not excessive risk-taking, and shareholder votes on executive pay.
• The democratization of the Federal Reserve, so that it is transparent and accountable to the public and independent of banking industry control.

Members

Coalition members include:

• AARP
• AFL-CIO
• AFSCME
• Alliance For Justice
• American Family Voices
• Americans for Democratic Action
• Americans United for Change
• Campaign for America's Future
• Center for Digital Democracy
• Center for Economic and Policy Research
• Change to Win
• Coffee Party
• Color of Change
• Common Cause
• Consumer Action
• Consumer Federation of America
• Consumers Union
• CREDO
• Demos
• Economic Policy Institute
• Essential Action
• Green America
• Greenlining Institute
• Good Business International
• Institute for Global Communications
• International Brotherhood of Teamsters
• MoveOn.org
• NAACP
• National Council of La Raza
• National Urban League
• National Workrights Institute
• OMB Watch
• Public Citizen
• SEIU
• Sojourners
• Taxpayers for Common Sense
• United for a Fair Economy
• United Food and Commercial Workers
• United States Student Association
• USAction

Personnel

• Lisa Donner, Executive Director
• Erin Kilroy, Administrative Manager
• Ed Mierzwinski

Contact details

1629 K Street NW, 10th floor
Washington, DC 20006
Phone: 202-466-3311
Email: info AT ourfinancialsecurity.org
Web: http://ourfinancialsecurity.org

Articles and resources

External articles

• Katrina vanden Heuvel, "Americans for Financial Reform," Nation blog, June 19, 2009.
• Isaiah J. Poole, "Financial Reform: Up To Us To Change The Game," Campaign for America's Future blog, June 17, 2009.
• Christopher Hayes, "Bucking the Banks," The Nation, June 24, 2009.
• Jane Hamsher, "Americans for Financial Reform: Waste. Of. Time.," FireDogLake blog, June 29, 2009.
• Christopher Hayes, "Is Americans for Financial Reform a 'Waste of Time?'," The Nation, June 30, 2009.
• David Cho and Michael D. Shear, "Obama Presents Bill to Create Consumer-Finance Watchdog - New Agency's Broad Scope Draws Stiff Industry Resistance," Washington Post, July 1, 2009.
• Victoria Crane, "Consumer groups ready for fight on new agency," Politico.com, July 15, 2009.
• Brady Dennis, Financial Industry Is in Group's Sight Veteran Activist Calls Coalition's Goal Of Reform a 'David and Goliath' Fight, Washington Post, August 22, 2009.

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