A People’s Hearing for a Public Bank
On January 24, 2022, labor leaders, environmentalists, community advocates, and workers came together to demand Governor Murphy keep his campaign promise and create a public bank that invests our tax dollars in us. Gov. Murphy pledged support for a public bank during his 2014 campaign and appointed an “implementation board” in 2019 which was tasked with holding public hearings. To date, no such hearings have taken place. Speakers discussed problems the bank could be used to solve and addressed concerns that the state’s implementation board has not proposed any public facing plan that resembles a public bank. New Jersey, the 11th most populous U.S. state with nearly 9 million people, collects billions of dollars in tax revenue from individuals and businesses every year. Most of that money is sent out of state to Wall Street and other locations. Corporate financial institutions charge high interest on loans to New Jersey schools, transit agencies, road commissions, and other public entities. The current model of outsourcing New Jersey’s financial needs to big banks – mostly based in New York – has led to an accumulated $6 trillion worth of public debt owed to out-of-state financial institutions. By contrast, in North Dakota – the only [...]