It turns outthe bankshave all of our money.
EnterAspiration, a Los Angeles-based alternative bank built to offer a more environmentally conscious take on financial services.
Here’s an edited transcript of the conversation.
And millions of people make these decisions daily.
That is where Aspiration comes in.
Through ourAspiration Spend and Save account, all of your deposits are fossil fuel free.
I think the second part of that equation of ‘do no harm’ finance is ‘do good’ finance.
American consumersspent $13.7 trillion in the third quarter of 2021 alone.
Every time you make a spending decision, you’re taking action.
It wasn’t my background.
We didn’t set out to build a bank.
We set out to build a better world.
I really didn’t have much interest in starting a financial institution.
Aspiration, in addition to climate change, also focuses on the mission of democratizing access to finance.
You offer a unique “pay what is fair” fee for some banking services.
We wanted to build something from the ground up, that was founded around fairness and positive impact.
It’s not enough to promote sustainability if the way that you make money is predatory.
The truth is that almost every other bank out there does better when their customers do worse.
We didn’t want to be in that business.
How does that shake out in practice?Most people choose to pay.
About three quarters choose to pay – even though they could be paying zero.
There’s also good work being done insustainable investing.
There are a few companies that are doing good work by financing climate solutions as well.
So there are others – but there aren’t a lot.
What’s coming next for Aspiration?There are all kinds of opportunities to make people’s lives sustainable.
Essentially, every time you make a purchase, we plant a tree.
Where do you see Aspiration in 10 years?
It needs to be.
