Mica Minute: What to do when bankers mislead

WASHINGTON (6/6/07)—Credit unions should use recent information from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) on bank tax breaks and profits to ask Congress to tell banks to knock off their anti-credit union attacks, according to Dan Mica, president and CEO of the Credit Union National Association (CUNA).

"What do you do when the bankers go to the Congress and mislead them or just plain lie," asks Mica in his latest blog posting.

The GAO report includes data showing net income has increased at banks an average of 7% for the last 10 years, when adjusted for inflation. During the same period, and using the same parameters, the study showed credit union net income increased only 3% annually.

Yet, the CUNA leader says, knowing this bankers still travel up to Capitol Hill and tell Congress that "credit unions are hurting their business, credit unions are hurting their bottom lines, credit unions shouldn't be allowed to exist."

The GAO report also noted information about bank tax breaks, including:

  • Thirty-one percent of all banks paid no corporate income taxes at all by becoming Subchapter S corporations;

  • Some banks have evaded millions of dollars in U.S. taxes by setting-up illegal tax shelters; and

  • The cost to American taxpayers for bailing out the Savings and Loan Industry in the 1980s has grown to more than $200 billion in today's dollars.

"This fed study has said you (banks) are misleading the Congress and we ought to say you better to stop it," Mica says, urging credit unions to tell federal lawmakers to tell that banks to "to knock it off, get on with your business and to leave credit unions alone."

Use the resource links to access Mica's blog, or go to www.danmica.com.

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