{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["http://www.moran.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/news-releases?ContentRecord_id=2454c451-96fd-4655-95eb-8fb64346c3da", "Senate Passes Moran-Brown Bill to Enhance Economic Mobility Via Prize-Linked Savings", "2014-12-10", "2014", "2014-12", "Republican", "House", "KS", "Jerry Moran", "M000934", "www.moran.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 Tonight, the U.S. Senate passed the\u00a0American Savings Promotion Act\u00a0(S. 1597/H.R. 3374) by unanimous consent. U.S. Senators Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), members of the\u00a0Senate Economic Mobility Caucus, introduced the\u00a0American Savings Promotion Act in October 2013 to allow the creation of prize-linked savings accounts (PLS). PLS accounts would incentivize personal savings by offering participants chances to win prizes based on savings account deposit activity while never putting their savings at risk. The legislation passed the House in September 2014 and now heads to the President.\r\n\r\n\u201cWith broad support, Congress has sent to President Obama the\u00a0American Savings Promotion Act, bipartisan legislation that clears the way for banks and other financial institutions to promote personal savings,\u201d Sen. Moran said. \u201cThis policy will help American families become more financially\u00a0secure and upwardly mobile. In passing the American Savings Promotion Act, the House and Senate have shown that good ideas may still have a chance in Washington.\u201d\r\n\u201cToo many families in Ohio \u2013 and across the nation \u2013 are living paycheck to paycheck,\u201d Sen. Brown said. \u201cBetween stagnant wages and an insufficient minimum wage, it\u2019s hard for families to prioritize savings. That\u2019s why this legislation is so important. Families should be encouraged and excited to save. This bill accomplishes that and I am proud to have worked with Sen. Moran to get this bill passed.\u201d\r\nThe\u00a0American Savings Promotion Act\u00a0would promote savings by creating a narrow exemption for prize-linked-savings (PLS) products. By removing federal barriers to banks and thrifts offering PLS products, the legislation clears the way for states to enable all interested financial institutions under their jurisdiction to offer these valuable financial tools. Forty-four percent of American households lack the savings needed to cover basic expenses for three months, leaving families vulnerable to financial uncertainty. In 2013, the personal savings rate dipped to just 3.8 percent, down from 10.5 percent in 1963.\r\nPrize-linked saving has been identified as an attractive way to incentivize saving by a broad range academics and financial policy professionals:\r\n\r\n \r\n\u2022 Stuart Butler of the Heritage Foundation\u00a0and author of\u00a0Boosting Economic Savings Through Prize-Linked Savings: \u201cThe dearth of savings in America, particularly among lower-income Americans, is a major obstacle to upward mobility and achieving the American Dream. The creative idea of prize-linked savings has proved to be very successful in boosting savings, but red tape blocks federally chartered financial institutions from offering these pro-savings products.\u201d\r\n\u2022 In a 2011\u00a0Financial Times\u00a0op-ed,\u00a0former Obama OMB Director\u00a0Peter Orszag\u00a0advocated for\u00a0PLS: \u201cIn the coming decade, we need a comprehensive effort to raise household savings. As part of that push, let\u2019s give savings accounts linked to lotteries a chance.\u201d\r\n \r\n \r\n\u2022 Tim Flacke, Executive Director of D2D Fund: \u201cBased on our last five years of work on prize-linked savings, we believe this is a proven and promising innovation to help engage Americans to save. We applaud the leadership of Senators Moran and Brown to help expand PLS through this bill so that more Americans can experience a fun and successful way to save.\u201d\r\n \r\n\r\nBackground\r\nThe Pew Foundation\u2019s Economic Mobility Project found that 71 percent of children born to high-saving but low-income parents emerge from the bottom income quintile in one generation, compared to only 50 percent of children from non-saving low-income households. While more than 40 percent of American households lack the savings to cover basic expenses for 3 months, Americans spend nearly $61 billion on lottery tickets each year.\r\n\r\nPLS products have great promise, but a broadly-written 1960s law banning banks from operating lotteries unintentionally precludes banks and thrifts from offering PLS products. More than half a dozen states have changed applicable state laws to allow credit unions within their borders to offer PLS products, but federal law limits the expansion of this savings-enhancing tool to other financial institutions.\r\n\r\nThe legislation would promote savings by creating a narrow exemption for PLS products while maintaining the ban on federally-insured financial institutions from operating lotteries. By removing federal barriers to banks and thrifts offering PLS products, the American Savings Promotion Act clears the way for states to enable all interested financial institutions in their jurisdiction to offer PLS products.\r\n\r\nThe House version of the American Savings Promotion Act was introduced by Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-Wash.) and Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.).\r\n   Click here to read a one-page summary of the bill.\r\n\r\n# # #", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["http://www.moran.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/news-releases?ContentRecord_id=2454c451-96fd-4655-95eb-8fb64346c3da"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.7336139678955078, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}