Publication: Mexico : Broadening Access to Financial Services Among the Urban Population, Mexico City's Unbanked, Volume 1, Main Report
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2005-09
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2012-06-19
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The present report looks at issues of access to financial services in urban Mexico, drawing on existing documentation as well as on research (surveys, interviews and focus groups) carried out in Mexico City during 2002. The motivation behind this interest in financial exclusion is two fold. First, it is well documented that being "unbanked" (excluded from access to financial services) has costs; and it makes it more expensive to engage in a number of transactions (paying and being paid) and more difficult to save while maintaining the value of an asset As such, higher access to financial services is desirable from an efficiency point of view. Second, financial exclusion is an issue that primarily affects the poor. Access to financial services can help with poverty alleviation, particularly to the extent that it encourage asset buildings and help cope with shocks and overcome liquidity constraints. The report focuses on two key questions: what are the benefits the unbanked (those excluded from financial services) could gain from using formal financial sector institutions; and what discourages them from doing so. The objective is to help to identify measures to increase access to financial services in Mexico. As such the report is organized as follows. Chapter 1 sets the stage by discussing the importance of access to financial services and what other countries are doing to promote such access. Chapter 2 presents an analysis of actual and potential demand for financial services, and offers a profile of the unbanked residents of Mexico City. Chapter 3 then looks at the supply of financial services by the formal financial sector and possible explanations for Mexico's extremely low rate of financial access. Chapter 4 concludes and discusses possible means of improving financial participation.
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“World Bank. 2005. Mexico : Broadening Access to Financial Services Among the Urban Population, Mexico City's Unbanked, Volume 1, Main Report. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/8407 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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Publication Mexico : Broadening Access to Financial Services Among the Urban Population, Mexico City's Unbanked, Volume 2, Annexes(Washington, DC, 2005-09)The present report looks at issues of access to financial services in urban Mexico, drawing on existing documentation as well as on research (surveys, interviews and focus groups) carried out in Mexico City during 2002. The motivation behind this interest in financial exclusion is two fold. First, it is well documented that being "unbanked" (excluded from access to financial services) has costs; and it makes it more expensive to engage in a number of transactions (paying and being paid) and more difficult to save while maintaining the value of an asset As such, higher access to financial services is desirable from an efficiency point of view. Second, financial exclusion is an issue that primarily affects the poor. 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Chapter 3 then looks at the supply of financial services by the formal financial sector and possible explanations for Mexico's extremely low rate of financial access. Chapter 4 concludes and discusses possible means of improving financial participation.Publication Exploring Lebanon's Growth Prospects(Washington, DC, 2006-06-27)This policy note reviews the current determinants of gross domestic product growth in Lebanon, and proposes a strategy to accelerate such growth in the years to come. Emigration and macro-economic trends will require urgent attention to foster growth. In the absence of job opportunities, half of each Lebanese generation eventually emigrates while another fourth stays idle. Lebanon's active population is aging, its human capital is eroding, and its resident population is aging. To reverse these trends, growth needs to be accelerated to meet Lebanese economic expectations. 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And it discusses the efforts that private sector and government organizations are making to lower the cost or improve the quality of those services. The paper summarizes available information on these issues and assesses the rationale and challenges facing the strategies that both countries are using to improve the financial services available to lower-income households, giving particular attention to "unbanked" households, meaning households that do not have deposit accounts with any regulated deposit-taking institution, and also to lower-income households in large urban areas. In comparing the experiences of the two countries, the paper reviews the extent to which lower-income households are unbanked, their use of non-bank financial services, and strategies for improving financial services to the unbanked. The underlying differences between the countries' typical household incomes-national income per capita in Mexico in 2002 was US$8,540, compared with $35,060 in the United States (World Bank 2003)-may also influence the difference in percentage of unbanked-9.1 percent of families in the United States compared with 76.4 percent found in a recent study in Mexico City.
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