Perspective: Recent moves by the Biden administration and the credit bureaus are positive steps, but problems remain.
. “As an industry, we remain committed to helping drive fair and affordable access to credit for all consumers,” the credit bureau CEOs boasted.This is just the latest chapter in a long history of politicians and activists trying to make the nation’s private credit reporting system more equitable by eliminating evaluation categories — such as race and gender — that explicitly reproduce inequality in American society.
This highly subjective system depended upon applicants meeting with credit managers, whose individual judgments determined whether the applicant got a loan or not. This solidified the reporting agencies’ role as gatekeepers, now with the power to set Americans on the course of wealth and prosperity with a government-backed mortgage — or to dash their hopes.Over the ensuing decades, White households overwhelmingly benefited, and continue to benefit, as federal credit policy expanded to include not only farm loans and mortgages, but also small business and student loans.
Women’s and civil rights groups also sought to eliminate racial, gender and other biased categories from consideration by credit granters. Led primarily by upper-class women who despised being treated like “dead beats,” these groups secured the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and amendments to it that barred discrimination against any credit applicant, “on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex or marital status, or age.
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