Why Mark Zuckerberg’s Libra project won’t bring more people into the financial system

But the solution won’t come from a new, privately controlled cryptocurrency system, one rife with potential risks.

Financial technology companies and cryptocurrencies have been promising for almost a decade that technology is the answer to financial inclusion, but none have delivered. For all their expertise in cutting-edge technology, these innovators have not demonstrated even a rudimentary understanding of the lives of the poor: Tech entrepreneurs usually start with a cool technology and only afterward make claims about helping the marginalized, rather than collecting data about what these communities really need and meeting those needs. The unbanked and underbanked are often stuck in a cash economy, do not have Internet access or rely on brick-and-mortar establishments to convert cash into digital. Facebook has no physical locations — certainly none in America’s banking deserts. Most of the unbanked or underbanked either do not have enough money for a bank account, do not…