Will the Grameen model, which developed in rural Bangladesh, work in the United States?
Professor Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank, has always expressed his belief that poor people can be trusted to pay back. It is the concept of trust in poor people that has made Grameen programs successful with its borrowers worldwide. The same holds true of Grameen America in the U.S., where 36 million people live below the poverty line. Grameen microcredit programs have succeeded all over the world, demonstrating that the concept of credit as basic human right transfers easily across cultures. We have not changed the Grameen group-lending model at all; the only difference is the average loan size.
