A few days after our recent post on pro-environment banking programs (here), we were greeted with this headline in yesterday's Seattle P-I:

The tide has definitely turned in media perceptions of online banking. Here's a short history of the mass media view of online banking:

1994 to 1997: Sounds good, but what is it?

1998 to 1999: All things online are great

2000 to 2002: All things online are over-hyped

2003 to 2006: Is it really secure?

2007 to ???: Protecting the earth and yourself 

Naturally, I think online banking is great, but I never expected to see it elevated to motherhood-and-apple-pie status. The PI article (here) uses recent NACHA and Javelin numbers to recommend online banking both for its paper-saving and identity-theft prevention benefits. Time Magazine (April 9 issue) also listed "paying your bills online" as one of 51 things consumers can do now to help the environment (here).

However, Time might need to beef up the math skills on its fact-checking team. The article says paying all bills online would save 1.6 billion tons of paper. That would be more than 2,000 pounds every month for every U.S. household, even I don't get that much junk mail. I'm guessing they meant 1.6 billion pounds not tons, which would be about 15 pounds of bills per year per household.