Money sent home by workers exceeds foreign in many countries.
Unlike , it arrives directly in a household's hands.
Surveys show it is spent mainly on food, school fees and medical costs.
It is also remarkably , rising when the home economy weakens.
Families abroad simply send more when they hear that things are hard.
The weak point of the system is the cost of .
Average fees still take about six percent of every payment.
On small, frequent s the percentage is higher still.
Digital operators have pushed fees down where regulation allows them to compete.
In with one agent, prices have barely moved in a decade.
Cutting the global average by two points would return billions to households.
That is a larger sum than most programmes deliver.
It requires no new money, only competition and identity rules that people can meet.