CUs Already Working Toward Diversity & Inclusion, Nussle Tells House Panel
In his letter to the subcommittee, CUNA's Nussle said that credit unions are committed to the issue of diversity and inclusion.
As a House subcommittee begins an examination into diversity in the financial services industry, CUNA president/CEO Jim Nussle said credit unions have been tackling the issue for years.
In a letter to the House Financial Services Committee, Nussle said that 52% of all credit unions CEOs are women. And he added that more than 10% of all credit unions are minority depository institutions—3.5 times the number of minority depository banks.
The newly formed House Financial Services Committee’s Diversity and Inclusion Subcommittee held its first hearing on the issue Wednesday and heard testimony from Daniel Garcia-Diaz, director of financial markets and community investment at the Government Accountability Office.
Garcia-Diaz said that the most recent figures concerning minorities in the financial services industry come from workforce data from Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reports.
But those figures do not separate credit unions from other financial institutions.
He said that representation of minorities in the financial services industry increased between 2007 and 2015, but the representation varied by individual minority groups.
Garcia-Diaz said that Asians had the largest gains, boosting their representation among managers from 5.4% to 7.7%. Hispanics made smaller gains, from 4.8% to 5.5%.
He said, however, that representation of African-Americans decreased from 6.5% to 6.3%.
He added that the representation of women in management remained at about 45% from 2007 to 2015.
In his letter to the subcommittee, Nussle said that credit unions are committed to the issue of diversity and inclusion.
He said that CUNA Board Chairman Maurice Smith recently formed a diversity and inclusion working group
Smith, CEO of the Local Government Credit Union in Raleigh, N.C., recently called for the addition of an eighth credit union cooperative principle to include diversity and inclusion.