Spent: Looking For Change (Full Documentary) | American Express

hey good how are you good I owe you money you're gonna pay the whole balance yeah which is 360 yeah how much did you say you spend in expenses every month the monthly expenses are primarily business expenses mislay stuff for the kids be it field trips lunch money ask money 60 80 maybe hundred bucks a week and get electricity I have insurance insurance health insurance a medicines for the kids and as when bill gets paid off in the next month there's more money for people to go to the movies it's over 100 150 for phone a lot of little expenses and day expenses would I be able to do like a swap of machines to get horses every month we spent anywhere from 2800 to $3,500 sometimes I'm left with hardly anything it sometimes is nail-biting it's a rollercoaster I have all this massive dad behind me and it feels so overwhelming we all want to get the most out of life great family and education a business a home so three bedrooms / four but for a growing number of Americans the price of getting ahead is higher because of the financial system that leaves millions underserved just have to kind of tuck your chin to your chest and keep going forward don't give up even when you want to there's not ever the option to not make it work I have to you ready yeah let's race I grew up dirt poor we were on welfare we were on food stamps I remember the first day of school you know everybody's always got their best gear on everybody's ready for the first day of school and my best kid came from Goodwill I often look back at my life from an early age there was a lot of wanting and disappointment despite his tough past Justin's built a small production company and wants to start a life with his girlfriend Brittany now that I'm gonna told and I'm making it I wonder came home family on my back so nobody ever has to water worry see that I love Brittany I'm gonna buy a ring and I'm gonna make her my wife I'm gonna do the things that are take us there he makes a good living shooting videos for corporate clients I see a lot of potential where we're at and where we're going but while business is good Justin's at a disadvantage I get checks from clients and I leave the luster and grandeur of Downton when I go uptown right into the check cashing place justin is one of 70 million Americans who lack access to the traditional financial system and as that number grows it includes more and more people who once lived in the mainstream very good okay now write that number down cuz we're gonna subtract so we really want him and 96 take away 149 my total answer is 87 you cooking with Crisco take you a minute to cook the meal but you're doing a good job you have to be your child's first teacher I told you you could do it and I believed in you just have to apply yourself and work hard my mom taught me pay what you owe and save so I saved savings accounts 401ks credit cards with wonderful limits wanted to have something to leave for my daughter we know we need an hour of math every night and we know we need at least 30 minutes of reading every day I want her to be able to find success in whatever her dreams are I chose to put her in private school because I don't want to ever compromise on her education I love you have a great day honey be good good luck on your test Tiffani worked as a nurse to provide for her family and built a nest egg for her daughter's future my 401 K was almost a hundred thousand life was good I was living the American dream hey honey yeah you were right there's a little too much water well they'll be crepes some of them will be crepes and some will be pancakes dude I like it when Melissa first met Alex he had a career in the music industry and was doing what he loved most I love this thing after one of the shows I went up and talked to Alex and kinda hit it off no kind of batter we just hit it off we hit it off about ten weeks after our first date he asked me to marry him just like everything else in my life the family thing happened pretty quickly with two kids and two incomes Alex and Melissa had a healthy happy home how's your good everyone was doing well and then our reality changed overnight their son was diagnosed with autism shortly after Alex was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis it was terrifying and then what happened was as I focused on the kids does it matter yes oh boy what do you want to get go burn Jane Burlington go play with ten not today hey we're we're doing today Jonah look up money yeah I can tell you to go and I'll get scheduling but if you don't go I can read it mom you got his attention eyes I had just gotten a new job I had steady income but then my mom was diagnosed with cancer that's my number one patient how can I take care of somebody else when I have my mom suffering at home Tiffany decided to leave her job so she could focus full-time on her mother's health I thought that I could come back to the workforce and just pick up where I left off the picture of the financially unstable is a picture of you and me but for a couple of breaks between Alex's illness and Jonah's diagnosis this became this huge expense that we had no contingency plan for we had no savings for Alex's illness affected his ability to work and he was forced to give up his job so they did what many Americans - at their bank if a bill came up and we needed to pay for the power or the cable we knew we could go ahead and write a check and it would clear when a customer withdraws more money than they have in their account they can give their bank permission to cover that cost with an added fee this is called overdraft protection banks were increasingly looking for profits from these classic consumer check accounts some customers didn't make money for banks so they found other ways to meet costs what most banks were doing as a customary practice was this check reordering or it's also called high-low check sequencing when Alex and Melissa paid their bills their grocery and student loan checks cleared okay but the price of power went up and that bill emptied their account one overdraft fee thirty five dollars but if all three debts posted on the same day their bank had software that reordered their purchases power bill first then loan than groceries three overdraft fees 105 dollars the fees became so much payday would come and we'd be back to zero eventually what the bank will do is boot them out of the system and close the account because they feel like they're not gonna riku their debt if banks can't keep those customers there's an alternative that will every year over 30 million Americans use check cashers and for many of them the service works they are open later they remember my name they're offering uh we can get you what you need right now kind of solution a huge amount of business gets done at check cashers because people can get their money right away and they need their money right away we've all had to wait a couple of days for a check to clear it's because when a bank clears a check it has to be scanned verified and processed by system that was built in the era of rotary phones most Western nations have found faster ways to clear our funds but not the US so Americans have to wait three to five days from now isn't acceptable for tens of millions of Americans if your lights gonna go up tomorrow you need to be able to have that clear now I'm not exactly sure when it's gonna clear and I have to pay my bills you go to the check casher you get the money back - the fee you have that money in your hands right at that moment it's not an irrational choice it's just not a productive choice and it's a costly choice underserved Americans spend the same percent of their income on fees and interest as the typical American family spends on groceries that amounts to eighty nine billion dollars a year as a way to avoid fees Alex and Melissa decided to live on cash we have cash on hand and that's money that we have this is all we can spend so when the money runs out that's it on pay day at getting to the places I can get the bills paid on time I know worry is good I'm here to pay the power so money is not a problem I'm Dylan being unbanked is really something like having a part-time job I probably spend quarter tank hefting gas driving on and paying bills you're gonna spend more money and more time doing things that people who are in the banking system take for granted and usually do for free you go to a check casher you are automatically having to pay somebody to get your money now you want to pay a bill will you have a wad of cash how are you gonna pay your bill I know how you do I just need to put some money on this card money is becoming more and more digital which means there are less places that accept cash that makes life for the underserved even more expensive we have prepaid debit card and the money that's on the card is real cash it's cash that I directly hand the people and they turn it into fake money for me it's convenient no if you don't have a bank account you can still do everything everybody else does but you get taxed Justin not only pays a fee turning his checks into cash and it's cash into a car he pays a fee for every purchase he makes there's the transaction and there's a buck in the transaction in a buck and buck all the way down to boring man it just kills you very quickly you can lose 80 bucks a month cashing your checks and another 100 bucks a month spending your money over the course of his career Justin could spin up to forty thousand dollars just to turn his paychecks into cash and another thirty thousand dollars using his card and that's just not how you get ahead it's not how you think about the future this is like fully hand-stitched and you know I have to like stitch every single I have to make every single hole before I stitch it nice yeah like every single one debbie is a designer struggling to grow her business but she is used to overcoming odds like being the first in her family to graduate from college more than being proud for myself I was happy that I could make my parents proud when she was 14 she emigrated from Argentina with her parents her father worked construction and her mother cleaned homes both my parents like people who work really hard and sacrifice our whole lives Debbie applied her parents work ethic and put herself through college with student loans then started her own business making leather bags by hand my mom said you were this tall you came up to me and asked me for a needle and thread she gave it to me and I started making clothes for my dolls so I figure out how to sew on my own when I was 4 years old after six months her bags are starting to sell beautiful the crossbody love it love it love weight to her now I can see all of these stores and I can see my company growing I can see it but because soon and loans have weakened her credit Debbie's dream has a limit banks use credit to measure a person's ability to repay a loan they look at a limited set of data length of credit history past loan payments and debt if you've never taken out a loan or a line of credit you're invisible to the credit scoring system I thought I was being responsible by not having credit cards and we already had a lot of friends who were really getting into that trap of maxing out a card so we got to get another credit card and another credit card and we didn't want to go that route not having a credit card may have saved Alex and Melissa from debt but it hurt them when it came time to get a loan we tried to buy a car we went to a car dealership and the car dealership told me you would more likely get a mortgage than you'd be able to buy a car and we reached out to a bank to say okay let's see we can get a mortgage and so you'd never be able to get a mortgage you should try to get a car there are lots of financial transactions one under tanks that are not actually tracked and the credit system and so people who looked like a high financial risk might not be when a bank looks at a borrower it doesn't see their monthly bill payments or rent or hard work it sees a number and if that number is damaged by past mistakes it's very difficult to recover people often judge me on the choices I've made not knowing the options that I had you Justin had to grow up fast when he was a teenager his family fell apart so at 16 justin was on his own paying rent and working every job he could just to support himself whatever his paycheck didn't cover he put on the card you can't get to work you need to pay somebody gas money you can even get some food whatever I needed like that had to get taken care of that I couldn't do I wasn't grown enough yet to address these mistakes in this situation in the proper fashion so you know what does a kid do they run Justin stop paying on his debt a mistake he's been working to overcome ever since when we set up shoots we'll have to live cameras out and the still or we might run her still as alive and while he's taking his life in business in new and better directions banks don't see where he's going they only see where he's been it's just frustrating because you know we've worked really hard for a really long time it's it's so hard to find a house yeah with his lease running out Justin wants to buy the kind of home he never had growing up a lot of these places are I mean they're like that their town owes their all for lease they're never for sale I can check on Craigslist okay thanks I think it's smarter to check okay exist the house that we can afford we're not gonna be able to get if she's the only one on the papers it's not enough with just her income but if I was on the papers my credit so bad that it would negatively impact us and we wouldn't get the house so I have a couple of things that I needed to get so you guys do the smaller order still right yeah okay Debbie has close to $100,000 in student loans but even though she pays a bill every month the debt makes it hard for her to move on in terms of pricing I guess that makes a difference these are more expensive they are okay millions I've had their credit scores impacted by having student loan debt and it's really stunting future opportunities for for the next generation you know what I do need knobs for where the strap goes okay those are little Pricer this year because it made out of solid brass it's 91 48 per gross I want to build my credit and I want to be able to be given the opportunity to have some kind of credit line Debbie's bank refused to give her a business loan instead they offered a secured credit card which is like a prepaid card except that it helps to build credit but the card has a 250 dollar limit how much is this one to make a single bag Debbie needs to hide cording zippers magnetic closures rivets lining ceiling components and linen thread this is the client when I go to get my supplies and I've reached my limit which happens almost immediately I have to tap it onto my personal cache which is a big stretch on a tight budget yeah I was gonna come out to a hundred and ten dollars okay because even after Debbie fills an order she still has to wait up to three months to be paid I just spent every last penny I had to my name and next week I already had stood alone set had to take care of those people live from paycheck to paycheck I lived from him back to his neck so this is great man it's quiet off the main road good freeway access most people when they're buying a house it's a compromise between price and location and for us buying a house it's the compromise between price location and the actual ability to get in to pass the process of getting in we can do it but it's not gonna be easy we've got to find just the right person in just the right spot and then might take a week I might take a month it's not gonna take one six you know what I mean it's gonna happen oh it even is a shed baby so this is just a guesthouse or what I mean like an office area what and then that oh my god how amazing would that be I mean if it's cool inside that would be so great I really like it I like it well let's give him a call we're ready financially we've got all our ducks in a row as far as you know proof of income and proof of residency and proof of bills we're ready hi my name is Justin Dickinson I was calling about the house for sale yes ma'am when our mom got sick Tiffany made a plan she decided to live off savings and return to work in a year but she didn't count on the recession now the only job she can find a part-time and they don't pay her enough to cover the bills I was working a travel assignment and Kingwood and it's up it is 50 miles one way I always say it to myself I'm a nurse I can get a job I'm educated I have associate's degree in psychology a bachelor's in nursing then I have an MBA after the financial crisis we saw many more people losing their jobs defaulting on debt the credit scores they just start dwindling because I had to decide what was more important when you're the caretaker for somebody that's an expensive tow but every day you need to be think airing your family don't lunch okay I do it I know this is different no not when one of your children needs more support than you originally expected the only thing you can do is provide for him the best care you can find that you can afford to get access to a school program that would meet his needs Jonah first had to get an exam we really needed a write-up to make sure that Jonah got into a program that was really gonna suit him a lot of the developmental psychologists were $2,500 to do this report without access to credit and no savings Alex and Melissa had no way to cover the cost nearly half of all US households live paycheck to paycheck and could not come up with $2,000 in an emergency it's increasingly more middle-class people - suddenly they're in a situation where they can't afford to keep a buffer in their accounts the way they used to before I had depleted my 401k that's how I paid the card notes the mortgage and if you're steady taking taking taking and nothing coming in it evaporates so you got to pay attention to your numbers are you adding or subtracting the process is different when you're subtracting the number is going to be less when you're adding the numbers get bigger my back was against the wall and I had borrowed as much as I thought I should be borrowing from friends and family what are my other options it used to be you could walk into a bank or to a finance company and get a $500 unsecured loan just on your signature but that product doesn't really exist anymore finance companies have essentially gone away so what filled the gap during that time 30 days they're easy to ignore until you actually need the money which is one of those things like you see that it's there but I didn't really know what it was I was in the stain of desperation of course I see this commercial it looks like it will fix all of my problems if you've got your title title match turn it into cash for you in just five minutes in the neighborhood we live there payday loan places all over the place they call it a payday loan because it's designed to be paid back on the borrower's next paycheck if you have a job and you have a paycheck you know come in sign up we'll give you this payday loan and then next payday you pay us off and it's like okay well let's do that title loans are like payday loans except instead of using your paycheck as collateral you put up the title to your car the company will give you a loan based on the value of your vehicle and if you don't pay it back then they take your car I'm like well I'm thinking about taking out this loan on my car how much do you think it's worth well let's go outside and take a look at it and then they say oh you should be able to get $5,000 I said okay we'll do this and I tied me over and when I start working we'll just pay it off when I first got the title long paid off the bills rent it was like a little kickstart for me in the moment when we needed it I was glad that it was there but then you get in a cycle where you can't get out of it I would get my paycheck but now I'm stuck where I was before right I don't have that money and we were living too close to the edge to not have it so we would just real own if the option is either paying off the loan or paying to extend it Americans on the edge don't have a choice week after week the account comes too but for some the fee is more affordable than paying off the principal so the loan is rolled over its how over the course of time a short-term loan can become a long-term crisis but even as the fees pile up the original loan is never paid off and so the spiral begins those loans are based upon this false idea that all somebody needs is a little bit of money to get to their next paycheck that's not what's happening what's happening is that people aren't able to make ends meet and getting a loan this pay period doesn't make that problem go away it only makes it a little bit worse the next pay period 80% of borrowers are forced to renew their loan after two weeks if you're in a situation where you have to get a payday loan you don't have the money you don't you know it's two weeks to payday and I've got $8 and I gotta make that stretch I got a job in Dallas while I was there one of my payments was dude so I called up they were like we can't take a payment over the phone you have to come in I said well can I go to one of your sister companies no you have to come to this store so by the time I get back fees have kicked in it was a routine I go and get the loan pay whatever bill it is and now in two weeks I owe them the money again and then they tell you can't make partial payments if you can't pay the whole amount then we're not taking anything I've got a quarter tank of gas we want to celebrate Gabriel's birthday at my sister's tomorrow so that's what that quarter take a gas is for if we need anything else we have to walk interest in fees is steady getting stacked on and it's getting higher and higher you always trying to run to the finish line but the finish line never come we have yet to be able to pay that off in full and so over the course of time we've spent about $1,700 how much was that loan original um 450 I got some goodies this is so cool yeah and you sure that one I love this one you want yes thank you I hunted I want to love it Debbie is meeting more and more boutiques who want to sell her bags for anyone else this would be good news I couldn't afford to have like a big contract come in and tell me like I want this many bags what about the chain one um this is the last one okay this is like the material I think I may have enough to make like maybe one or two more and then and then what Cotton's this is the last of it absolutely okay today she has more orders than she can handle the reality of it is I won't be able to produce it I gotta do like you've been on first and see how much it cost me it's scary sometimes good its I'm trying to build something I just don't have the means without credit or the cast to fund the order she has no choice but to take another job hi Justin Justin and Britney need to convince a seller that they are credible homebuyers that's a great spot this is nice I like a lot we have to find individuals who are willing to work with us who can trust the last few years history of income as opposed to the last ten years history of credit well it is still on the market right Apple weeks right then though I'm sure they'll be more willing to listen to an offer breath but at this point it's probably a little too soon yeah you I never thought I'd see myself at a pawn shop unless I was buying something cuz there's a place to get some great deals not realizing that those deals were other people's dreams Thera was selling my dreams I woke up and that sounds like my alarm on my car by the time I got there it was a tow truck taking the car on around the corner this is how I get to work after a 14-hour day it doesn't end regardless of how many nights I don't sleep it's just not enough this sucks baby dick Tommy really trying to better my life become a different person it's hopeless I ended up having to take her out of private school mommy while we're not going to this school anymore that artists these situations have taken families that hit a bump in a road and pulled them down into a major crisis people end up at the doors of our social service providers what happens when a family runs out of options what happens when a mother can't give her daughter the education she needs what happens when an entrepreneur gives up her dream or the door closes on a young couples future the financial landscape is changing and changing fast one in four households are underserved many of them are hardworking families servicemen and women and college graduates in the last five years Bank branches have been closing at record rates while check cashing and payday loans are thriving because you get closer and closer to the edge there are fewer places for people to go but there's some reason for hope a new generation is using innovation and technology to reimagine the way we bank in San Francisco a business is helping people pool their money together and lend to each other so families have a better option when money gets tight in New York there's an organization that's giving affordable loans to growing businesses so entrepreneurs can see their ideas come to life and outside Atlanta a company is building a new type of credit score using rent and monthly bill payments so underserved Americans have a path to the mainstream it's about having a range of options available that enable people to spend save borrow and plan but for too many of us when we need it the most good options aren't available tens of millions of hardworking Americans are trying to reach their potential and they're waiting wanting believing in a simple promise that if they strive forward they won't be held back this is edition nothing nothing testing so rather be working for something then fall away someone on to someone else is saying move to the call Michaela under mounting so Patti swear in the ocean except on my that's all I would watch the show currently through the bay things mom we don't eat until your father had the table we don't drink until the devil's turn to dust never once has any they want to learn so if I were you and have all let's all trust two thousand years two thousand years sunk like a Sun desperately reaching from that's that the fisherman at home and trying to find little bit me I was home all of my secrets often here pages were phone and there was nothing at all so if in the future my a myself a savior I remember what was written so we don't need on sale your at the table we don't drink until the start to die has any man weapon they bought two so if I were you down more my house Oh you

Channel: American Express

Views: 1,158,647

Rating: 4.5897694 out of 5

Keywords: documentary, the young turks, TYT, news, guggenheim, tyler perry, waiting for superman, an inconvenient truth, it might get loud, bank, payday loan, budgeting, check cashing, finance, credit card, american express, AMEX, participant, money, economy, personal finance, financial services, underbanked, business, spent looking for change, spent, looking for change, debbie, small business, americans, financial problems, money management, film, full documentary, Derek Doneen, director, Oscar

Id: pTd9Z2nCjM0

Length: 40min 3sec (2403 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 04 2014

Reddit Comments

[u/tenoxone]

So Amex made this Doc? Trying to figure out what the spin is here...

[u/iheartbaconsalt]

Oh man, I've been in that crazy situation of extreme debt, payday loans, etc. It was not a happy time. I wish I had just signed up for every fucking payday loan and left the country.

[u/3_to_20_characters]

This made me kinda sad. My step father got caught up in payday loans. I thought he was just an idiot but in reality he was just trying to do everything he could in his power to keep this ship floating.

[u/bcicles]

ummm in what world can't that guy Houston get a checking account??

[u/Xaveel]

How to know more infos about people in the video? I would like to write to someone of them.

[u/SerpentDrago]

Can someone explain how that guy with a production company , can't get a checking account ?:

[u/kirkgobangz]

This is sorta the reason I opt out of overdraft protection and eventually turned in the debit card for a ATM card.

[u/jenasolomon]

Nice watch!