Being poor is very, very expensive.
i've talked about this on here before, but like...i didn't have a bank account until i was 24 — until i started working at the New York Times — because I couldn't *afford* it. I couldn't afford ATM fees and minimum balance fees or the $10 min to use my card at the bodega.
these fees — minimum balance fees, overdraft fees — are a way for banks to pad their profits, and they're necessarily only assessed to poor people and the economically unstable.
it made more sense for me to pay that little one-time charge at the check cashing place than it did to get nickel and dimed by onerous bank fees for way more $.
