Credit Unions a Natural Fit for Millennials

 Millennials comprise the largest generation alive today with more than 75 million individuals between the ages of 18 and 34. While they are already a powerful money-spending group – to the tune of $1.3 trillion annually – they are predicted to become a powerful paycheck-earning group by 2025, with three out of every four workers globally being millennials. But before they account for most of our workforce, there is work to do to raise credit union awareness among millennials. Credit unions have much to offer this key demographic.

Between 2013 and 2014, nearly two million millennials became members of credit unions, which reflects a 2% increase. Credit union membership, currently more than 100 million strong, is expected to grow at about 2-3% annually over the next decade – not bad considering the U.S. population growth rate is only about three quarters of a percent, the lowest level since the Great Depression.

As member owned, democratically governed, not-for-profit cooperative financial institutions governed by volunteer boards of directors, credit unions can really resonate with millennials. They like the fact that we don’t have stockholders on Wall Street and instead pass earnings to our members. For-profit banks, in contrast, pass profits made from customers to stockholders, which mainly consist of big, out-of-state Wall Street corporations and wealthy individuals. Younger people seeking financial services in the post-Wall Street meltdown of the last recession are attracted to credit unions’ value-based decision making.