AP Photo/Nati Harnik EZ Money Check Cashing in Omaha, Nebraska. The Unbanking of America: How the New Middle Class Survives By Lisa Servon Houghton Mifflin Harcourt This article appears in the Winter 2017 issue of The American Prospect magazine. Subscribe here . U nbanked. The term has an ominous undercurrent if you assume, as most of us do, that being “banked” is essential to quality of life. An unbanked person does not have a checking or savings account and lacks access to mainstream credit cards or loans. In 2015, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), 7 percent of U.S. households, or about 15.6 million adults and 7.6 million children, qualified for this label. Another 19.9 percent, or about 51.1 million adults and 16.3 million children, were “underbanked,” meaning that they had an account at an insured financial institution but also used “services and products outside of the banking system.” What’s available out in the cold? Payday loans that must be repaid...