One-third of Americans are hanging on by their fingernails
I happened to be reading this article about the horrific state of personal finances in Detroit, when this graph caught my eye. Notice the last item.
Thirty-five have debt in collections. That's horrible!
Total credit card debt in America is about to top $1 Trillion for the first time ever.
Then it occurred to me that I've seen the 1/3rd ratio before.
For example, here.
Last year, GoBankingRates surveyed more than 5,000 Americans only to uncover that 62% of them had less than $1,000 in savings. Last month GoBankingRates again posed the question to Americans of how much they had in their savings account, only this time it asked 7,052 people. The result? Nearly seven in 10 Americans (69%) had less than $1,000 in their savings account.
Breaking the survey data down a bit further, we find that 34% of Americans don't have a dime in their savings account, while another 35% have less than $1,000. Of the remaining survey-takers, 11% have between $1,000 and $4,999, 4% have between $5,000 and $9,999, and 15% have more than $10,000.
Not a single dime of savings. That's always just one piece of bad luck away from disaster.
46% of Americans can't afford a surprise $400 expense.
Nearly 2/3rd of Americans can't afford a surprise $500 expense.
The one-third number popped up again in retirement savings.
The data revealed that as many as one in three have a grand total of $0 saved for retirement, while 56 percent have saved less than $10,000.
While I haven't done the math, I'm sure that many of these households can barely pay the rent.
Roughly one-in-eight Americans are "rent-burdened".
More than 42,555,055 Americans — or roughly one in eight people nationwide — are spending an unsustainable amount on rent...
The numbers get grimmer the closer you look. Within that horde of overburdened renters, more than 22.6 million individual Americans are “severely rent burdened” — meaning rent and utilities gobble up more than half their household’s total income every single month.
52% of Americans had to make at least one major sacrifice in order to cover their rent or mortgage payments.
Lord only know how they will afford the 25% Obamacare premium hikes, or the 1.4 million losing their coverage.
Basically, one out of three people reading this are so financially fragile that they are just one stiff breeze away from ruin. No storm necessary.
So is there rough financial seas on the horizon?
Yes, yes, and yes!
I hate to think what will happen when so many people go from unsustainable to intolerable.
Comments
I must have
a stomach made of steel to not get ulcers from your reporting gjohn.
I'm also thankful that I have never been a material person.
Food in the cupboard and a roof over my head are all I've really ever wanted. Both of those, to a major extent, I supply myself.
As always, great essay!
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
It's important to know how widespread this is
This isn't some distant city or village.
1-in-3 means it's someone you know.
(raises hand on all of the above)
Yup.
One in three? That's probably about right.
Our rent is more than half the take-home. It's obnoxious, and it's going up every year. Our credit is shot, so we'll never get to buy a home. We are, indeed, one disaster away from homelessness and have been for years now. It's a wonder neither of us has ever gone completely mad.
I know a popular sentiment among us cynics has long been "Oh, most Americans are too comfortable to rise up against the government"--and that may be true and may have been for many years. But lately, I find myself thinking that can't possibly last that much longer. I used to think I wouldn't live to see the day, but this kind of reality makes me think lately that I probably will.
But are most Americans too
But are most Americans too comfortable, or too worn and tired with day-to-day, hand-to-mouth survival stress, to be able to deal with the causes of this situation and to demand a government actually of, by and for the people, as it must be in order to form legitimate government?
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Of course
it's someone I know. I see it every day.
And Detroit is just a heartbeat away.
All people should drive through that city. And I'm not talking about the expressways or just the affluent areas. Take a real trip. Make sure it's during the daytime when you can truly see the blight and despair. See the abandoned factories that the big three left behind along with the rot, decay, contamination, broken lives, lost dreams and hopelessness. And it's already in or coming to a town near everyone.
What a country. What a world.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
people can't take any more.....
-- Jackson Browne, "Lives in the Balance"
source
It's not just for brown people living in the tropics any more, but rather for us all.
[video:https://youtu.be/Ms5J2U_ySdI width:480 height:360]
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
Jackson just keeps singing the truth.
And maybe the most important lines:
[video:https://youtu.be/5yeFsgjKvLY]
I guess this means that in the USA that debt free citizens
can be considered relatively well off, even if they own NOTHING. A lifetime of living in debt is little different than indentured servitude, and has probably been the aim of the 1% all along. Without further government interference there'll be no stopping them.
“ …and when we destroy nature, we diminish our capacity to sense the divine,and understand who God is, and what our own potential is and duties are as human beings.- RFK jr. 8/26/2024
Bernie Sanders tried to put a cap of 14%, then 15% on
interest charges and failed:
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/release-senate-app...
Profit uber alles is the golden calf in our economic structure, one that regards us as consumer units and attaches little (if any) value to us collectively outside that role. Usury? What a quaint notion.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." --Jiddu Krishnamurti
So who does Obama pick as VP in 2008? Biden (D-Bankcorpstan) n/t
Biden's experience to balance Obama's light legislative record
More experience that, like Hillary Clinton's, should be scrutinized. Remember Biden'is presiding role in the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings?
And his role in personal bankruptcy "reform"?
Joe Biden's greatest betrayal: http://www.salon.com/2015/10/21/joe_bidens_greatest_betrayal_the_one_sen...
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." --Jiddu Krishnamurti
The discontent is there; the hurt is there; the numbers are
there; legislatures and the courts are a cruel joke on wage earners & those who wish they were wage earners; instant means of communication are in place and widely are available: The question is, where is the movement and which person or cadre will seize the opportunity to lead a people centered re-taking of American democracy?
The system we are up against is fully integrated and global: Manufacturing; Finance; Police; Military; establishment Political parties but a People, Not Profits movement can succeed.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
Yes, 40% of Americans live
Yes, 40% of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck:
http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2015/saving-spending-and-livi...
And, 47% of Americans are $400 away from a financial emergency. (If there was a sudden/emergency need for $400, 47% of our population would have to borrow the money or sell a personal possession, or they would not be able to come up with the money, at all.)
And, you're just scratching the surface (statistics-wise) with regard to how bad it really is for almost half our country's population, right now.
"Freedom is something that dies unless it's used." --Hunter S. Thompson
Missed a link in previous comment...
Second link for previous comment: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/05/my-secret-shame/476415/
"Freedom is something that dies unless it's used." --Hunter S. Thompson
Perhaps one of the most
Perhaps one of the most depressing aspects was the felt reiteration by the author of how 'the poors' have 'failed' by not being at least comfortable, when it's the fault of the greeds for draining everything and everyone around them over recent decades and most especially that of government for not acting for the public good in preventing this predation on society and the environment.
This is an outrageous example of how damaging such propagandistic societal conditioning really is...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
And here I can't decide which $1000 pair of shoes to buy
to go with my $10K suit to drive in my $110K car out of my $10 million house to a $1000 per plate fundraising dinner for Hillary Clinton. But you know, those kind of decisions can be quite stressful.
And to think, any of those people, which is really about 70% of the population, that votes for either Clinton or Trump will be voting against their best interests. They have no representation.
It's time to represent ourselves.
I just returned from Chile.
According to the local guide, who's word I am taking, and I have not done any research on this, as I just got off the plane, they have a very stable economy, 66% of their population is middle class, 144,000 young adults will start free college this year, in 5 years all high school grads will get free college education, and anyone who has a steady job and good work record gets government assistance to purchase a home, with the goal of all people owning, not renting, homes.
84 diseases/conditions are treated for free, such as osteoporosis and certain cancers, and if public hospitals are full, the private hospitals must take them in for treatment for free.
The Chilean economy is robust, rich people come to the table, AGREE to tax hikes, and they have an old age pension guaranteed, 60 for women, 62 for men. Anyone here can correct me, as I am brain dead from "sleeping" on a plane with a 2 year old baby in the seat behind me.
This is what I remember from the tour guide.
Compare/contrast as you will, folks.
Chile. Everything I thought I knew about it was flat out wrong.
And they do it without oil.
What in the world is wrong with the US?
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Greed.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
I would hazard a guess that Chile
doesn't ponce around the world trying to stave off terrorists, aliens, meteors and Putin.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Chile got BADLY burned by austerity under Pinochet
and learned the hard way that free-market libertarianism leads to authoritarian social disaster. They have learned from their errors; we never seem to learn a damn thing from ours.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
I knew I liked Chile and Chileans
...... ever since I saw those miners getting rescued in 2010.
article on the 2010 Copiapó mine rescue
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
omigod
It was my guide, George (Jorje) that picked up the 2 American drillers and the Aussie engineer at the airport, took them to the Presidential Palace. Interpreted. They did the work to save the miners.
The mine owner didn't have required insurance, the government paid for and is till paying for the ptsd and other ailments of the "33", and the government confiscated the rich mine owner's assets. The mine is closed, the owner is bankrupt.
HE PAID.
The government showed him no mercy.
Again...
What has happened to our country?
George could name every miner, and tell where they are, what they are doing. How they are doing.
Bankruptcy court didn't shield the crooked mine owner in Chile, but it does here.
Again, and again, and ad nauseum...
What happened to us?
So you know, 3 are bat shit crazy, despite psychological care.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
the 3
Damn!
I'm sorry to hear that.
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
How many folks died or went mad, buried by too-big-to-jail banks
and financial firms and the world economic crisis they and their derivatives casino caused?
Well, there is a link in the Peace Train OT I believe
that on 10-17-16 Chileans were protesting their private pension programs in which they are forced to participate.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAK4LsACudY]
O.k. When is the next meeting for the revolution?
-FuturePassed on Sunday, November 25, 2018 10:22 p.m.
WS/DC
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
Income has been flat for decades except for the 1%
I call it "trickle down shit".
I just saw a video that claimed that a higher percentage of Americans didn't feed themselves for lack of money at least one day last year than the Chinese.
The political revolution continues
I call it class war and this is what the capitalists have won
with the non-stop war on the left since the beginning of the 20th century, or maybe a little earlier. Anything that threatens those who control the political economy is stomped down when it can't be marginalized.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
"trickle down shit".
That's really unnatural.
My Civil Engineering Professor explained the First Law of Engineering to the class..."shit rolls downhill." So, to see an example where it doesn't, well, that just screams "unsustainable situation."
N.B. the Second Law says "you can't push a rope."
"I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.” —Malcolm X
Who's more corrupt and oligarchical *now*, the U.S. or China?
Who is the more corrupt, high-handed, fawned-over-by-mass-media leader, Xi or Her?
I took a train from Beijing to Xian some 20 years ago
I got a whole 1st class cabin with 4 bunk beds for James, my Chinese assistant, and me. (It was only $80)
I told James to call the train manager. He came and I gave him a 100 renminbi tip (about $10) and told him I would give him another if I was happy at the en of the 28 hour trip. After some insistence he took it. I learned this trick from my grandfather.
I got great service. Every stop 2 stewardesses changed our sheets and they brought us water and they asked us if we needed anything. I was impressed.
While I was in the dining room car James came and told me that we had a problem.
The traveler in the next compartment was a high ranking Communist party official who complained that I was getting better service than him.
I told James not to worry and to call the train manager again. I told the manager that I would give him another 100 renminbi if they treated the Communist party official the same way. He refused. He and his assistants were very unhappy and they told me that they would treat him even worse. And they treated us even better.
After a while I actually felt sorry for the party official, a form of oligarch. And let's not forget about Mao's propensity for trains.
Now they have high speed trains but clearly the Chinese are not into catering to the powers to be.
The political revolution continues
Mid-1980s, I and a friend boarded the Yangtse riverboat at Wuhan
Just having something called “first class” was still considered too much like the bad old days, pre-Liberation. The most luxurious class of accommodations and meal service, reserved for Western tourists, was called “second class.”
Tthe rather spartan mode of travel for ordinary Chinese people, with much inferior but also very much cheaper meal service, was called “third class.”
^^^This^^^
Not only are wages being suppressed, but job security has become almost non-existent. Many jobs have been converted to independent contractor status which means no benefits. The middle class manufacturing jobs have been shipped overseas too. And yet they want to do more to strip what little wealth there is left in the middle class in this country.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
The USA Today article
you linked to was really outrageously biased . It shamed people for not saving with absolutely ludicrous solutions for building a savings account. If you look at the demographics from the survey they start at !00,000$ a year and on up and then go down to the working poor. What about the vast majority of us who are not poverty level but do not make over 100,000$ a year? i read the solutions on how to budget your cash flow and laughed out loud.
How many people have salary's or corporate jobs that pay enough to live decently on these days? Let alone save money. How many of us are contractors, small business owners or working several jobs to make ends meet? We are a self proprietorship business to business company. Our cash flow is unpredictable. Our working hours are insane. Almost every worker in this country is at the mercy of the 'markets'. Most of the population is hanging on by their finger tips. Hey, we slice and dice surveys, public opinion, for a living and this is some bogus gui9lt tripping on people who are doing the best we can to get by.
Maybe it would be a good thing if this fucked up mess went from 'unsustainable to intolerable'. Intolerable might just do the trick and get the complacent doing okay off their asses and out in the streets.
I really wonder what the real percentage of ordinary people who make enough money to have any choice between wantonly consuming and are 'living beyond their means' is. I have 8.00$ in my savings account and my account receivables which is quite hefty right now is already spent on taxes, a new roof, and living after the rush of jobs this election has generated.
Gimmie a break who can save when every damn thing is an emergency and the vultures swoop down and say how much do you have? Disaster capitalism in action. Need a roof 16,000$ need a doctor? 7,000$ (if your lucky) Need new compatible software and a new computer 8,000$. Need the rent (2 months) + deposits and a good credit rating? And then comes the tax man who says 15% is mine even if you only made 40,000$ last year. Who can save? Rch people maybe but they would rather put their money in the casino. This bs. is insult to injury.
This BS is why you're so frustrated
that you make all that money and can't save shit--forgive me if I've misunderstood your post. I've never made 100k in my life, and I don't find the "savings tips" in that article insulting, I find them hysterically laughable because as you note, they're just ridiculous. Maybe you are just getting mad where I'm just laughing. I have to laugh, otherwise, I'll start crying hysterically, and then I won't be any good to anybody.
Thing is, that's not really the important takeaway here. What's important here is this. Because you're absolutely correct:
That's true in my world, and I don't even make half of a hundred K. I suddenly took on a new expense a couple weeks ago called Hurricane Matthew. We lucked out, but we blew a nice chunk of change getting ready for it. That was the extra money I'd put away for the holidays, and now I ain't got shit to show for it.
Figured another perspective might help you--the bottom line is still the same for both of us, though, I suspect: I work my ass off--and so do you, no doubt--and what the fuck do we have to actually show for it?
No way lunachike do
we make a 100,00$. We're losers in this sick game. Never have never will. I totally agree. We cannot prepare for any 'emergency' no matter what it is named. We got screwed in the last epic storm here by our home insurance and that led to the tarp we had that blew off in the next epic storm this October. So if you do not make over 100,000$ your screwed? If you get old and don't have a big savings account your a loser and good luck? This is a totally fucked up so called economy.
I just got pissed off at the USA Today article blaming ordinary people like you and me for not having a savings account. We're pretty lucky and that in itself is sick. We have half a roof over our head and enough money to barely cover the mortgage and food etc. This is not tolerable let alone something we should give our consent to by voting for more of the same because it could be worse. Yeah maybe so, but how does that equate to voting or supporting any lesser evil. No thanks I refuse to ever again out of baseless fear vote for any of these psycho killers.
Ah, got it
I read that first part wrong. And yeah, everything else you said, too...
Now imagine the 1%, media and politicians and bankers, suddenly
telling you the 99% has gotta tighten their belts even more to pay for refugees fleeing the 1%'s
warshumanitarian interventions.Now you feel what a lot of people in Europe feel, that is making them vote right-wing.
Anti-anxiety medications
appear to have become a popular way of dealing with some off this stress.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGymr78FtbU width:475 height:395]
See your doctor, and keep on truckin.
native
We need more medications
and less drugs. What a joke.
Marijuana is my medication and drug of choice.
Makes me less of a pricknick.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
cannabis
In jurisdictions where permitted, I'd consider cannabis instead.
"Don't take their evil pills." -- Dammit Janet
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
It's you damn
law abiding citizens that give marijuana users a bad time.
I live legal now. But legality never stopped me.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
I never claimed lawful alignment!
I never claimed lawful alignment! Neutral good, for Cat's sake!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
"In jurisdictions where permitted"
Yes, you did.
Peace
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
It's a goddamn human right.
To alter your consciousness.
You don't need no stinkin' permit.
I Often Struggled With Alignment as a Gaming Kid.
I liked the role playing, but I never got my alignment... until right now.
I'm Neutral Good. Neutral Good is good for me. Thanks T.
“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu
any time, k9d!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
Abilify the antipsycotic drug for all occations
The happy pill approved to boost your antidepressant. The prescribing information contains all the early death warning as other antipsychotics, as well as some serious side effects. Not for the faint of heart.
Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.
I loved this part:
YAK!!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
Any port in a storm, I guess.
And big pharma's turning a tidy profit, renting out psychic lifeboats.
native
That blue lump in the chair, depression?
Before my father died, he saw and described a brown lump, person-sized who sat in a chair in the room with him. He was a habitually-depressed human, Librium-addicted for much of his later life. My 96 y/o mother is in a nursing home (finally) and after a week they are threatening to kick her out as she is in constant psychosis and lives and converses with dead people. Sure makes me excited about my future.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
This is why I paid off my house
All I need worry about now is about $1100 a year in property taxes. I will have a dry place (not necessarily a WARM dry place) to consume my cat food, assuming I can get the cats to share.
I have a joke of a pension, but I can lose that if my employer successfully terminates me for cause. I haven't been able to save much, between a wife who likes expensive cruises and the support of unemployed offspring (although there is better news on this front after many years). What could have been a 401(k) went into paying off the house, which I much prefer to risking it to the Wolves of Wall St.
I just have to make it to Medicare age, and I won't be in bad shape. Unfortunately, that remains a couple of years away, and I don't trust Paul Ryan as far as I can throw him.
Vowing To Oppose Everything Trump Attempts.
I really really didn't want to read this.
Because I am there and coming up fast to that one breeze that will blow it all away to sharing the nightmare that millions of Americans are now living. All I have left is irony. There are so many ironies though hard to catalog them. One of the ones that sticks in my mine is Clinton being totally oblivious to the movement for a $15/hour min. wage. And what advice did she did from so progressive advisers? Not to endorse it, but settle for $12/hour IF THAT. I am taking the advice of democrats to vote my interest and that does not mean any democrat democrat. I won't vote for Trump, but I am not afraid of it. How worse can it get, because with Clinton it will get worse.
so...
So that 35% of Americans who are in collections (an award can take 10% of your pay in perpetuity in my state)...are they the folks the $$Hillary camp call "fortunate" and "privileged" because they dared to support Sanders then and Stein now?
$$Hillary feels your pain.
She's never going to do anything to make your situation better, but she feels your pain.
If I have to listen to 4-8 years of 'she couldn't get anything done except for TPP and some fresh new pipelines' because Republicans, I may puke myself to death.