Empowering bank workers to have a voice on the job will protect customers

A new study describes the importance of empowering frontline bank workers to creating a more sustainable banking system. “Tipping the Balance: collective action by finance workers create ‘regulation from below’” compare U.S. bank workers to other industrialized countries where most bank workers are unionized.

Christy Hoffman, President of UNI which has affiliate unions representing over 3 million bank workers around the world, commented, “Unionization in the financial sector—the norm in nearly all advanced economies, except for the United States—provides a way to “strengthen financial regulation” from the ground up. Unions are a countervailing force against the worst tendencies of the financial sector, in part by guaranteeing that pay schemes are not driven by the extreme sales pressure and unfair performance metrics.”