The average American consumer is “tapped out” when it comes to their debt load. As a matter of fact, just about everyone in the world is in the most amount of debt they have ever been in, in history.
As delinquencies and layoffs rise, Americans are increasingly finding themselves in a precarious situation. Already paying a lot in debt repayments, Americans who face a financial burden are already so far in debt they can no longer borrow their way out. Everything is fine as long as they can make the payments.
According to Bankrate, the number one reason (40 percent) why Americans aren’t saving their money is that they have too many other expenses. Interestingly, only 13 percent of those surveyed by Bankrate cited debt as the reason why they’re not saving as much as they should. According to Forbes, that little tidbit is “interesting” because total U.S. consumer debt, including revolving and non-revolving debt, now stands at more than $4 trillion, the most ever. Have Americans become so delusional that they’ve stopped thinking of debt as an expense and a chunk of money they have to repay?
Debt is beginning to impact every aspect of American life and culture. It affects us all, but it can seriously hinder workers’ ability to retire on time. The more you’re on the hook to pay lenders, the less you have to pay yourself. Revolving debt, such as credit card debt, is now valued at more than $1 trillion, which exceeds the all-time high right before the financial crisis. Student loan debt is also a concern, as it stands at $1.5 trillion.
https://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/americas-debt-crisis-consumer-credit-card-debt-continues-to-rise_04092019
Regardless of the red flags in the market and economy as a whole, Americans seem all to happy to keep borrowing more money. Overall consumer debt reached $13.3 trillion in the fourth quarter of 2018 according to Experian, as reported by the Motley Fool.
It has become far to easy to borrow money and there is a good chunk of Americans that will never be able to pay back what they’ve promised. Debt often destroys your ability to keep your word. Most Americans overspend and lack the very basic self-control needed to have a massive amount of credit available to them. This is more than obvious when looking at the spending behaviors of those in our own neighborhoods.
The harsh lessons of the Great Recession a decade ago have already been forgotten.
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The top 50% are doing just fine Mac.
The bottom 50% suffer from their stupidity and their blaming everyone for their irresponsibility.
The ones to blame are the idiots that use the cards and don’t wipe out the balance each month. And they deserve jackshit for spending money they didn’t EARN.
This debt all boils down to people not controlling their impulses. Would I like a new iMac computer? Sure I would but my current 7 year old computer works just fine. My truck is 20 years old and runs great, my watch is 12 years old and keeps perfect time, and I have never been to Tahiti. You get my point. Control your impulses and you will control your debt.
bingo !
instant gratification vs. delayed gratification
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnGiGeNYciM&t=4s
So this says people cannot take on more debt YET 2 articles down it says credit card debt keeps rising lol. WTF? Which one is it?
“Debt often destroys your ability to keep your word. ”
No, your willingness to not keep your word destroys your desire to pay back debt. I’ve never understood how people (or companies) who declare bankruptcy can sleep at night knowing that they basically screwed over anyone that trusted their word enough to give them something based on a promise.
Frankly I think the major downfall with our financial mindset as a nation right now is the lack of morality when using credit.
Was it Einstein who said something to the effect that compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world? He who understands it, earns it. He who doesn’t, pays it.
I’ve got a novel solution. Everyone stop going into debt. Quit using the damned credit cards. Try working up a program to pay down, then off, all you’ve racked up to date. Once done, don’t do it again. Simply keep paying the same monthly or whatever time-frame you were doing after the debt is cleared into an account that belongs to you. Even if it is just a cleaned out jelly jar, it doesn’t matter. The action is called ‘saving’. To put aside your funds for what you want when/once you can afford those things.
Heartless, damn good advice. I’m debt-free and don’t regret for one minute. Gives me extra financial capacity for prepping. My prepping is my top priority to me and I don’t care about anything else. Those who refuse to prep are inept.
Dave Ramsey is right. If you owe anyone any amount of money, do whatever you have to in order to pay it off. Sell stuff, take extra jobs, eat cheaper, don’t take vacations, whatever you have to. And then don’t ever borrow again.
I am moving along on my plan. My medical expenses will all be paid for by the end of this year. After my current car, I will start paying cash for nearly new cars. After the current car is paid off, I will work on the mortgage and pay it off years early.
I’ve already taken some recurring small expenses off my one credit card and put them on a debit card. So that will end the one credit card. Dave Ramsey says you don’t have to worry about a good credit score if you don’t ever use credit again. He says that, as far as he knows, he doesn’t even have a credit score.
Been living that way for 19 years now. I have no idea if I have a score either. If I need something or have an emergency that I can’t cover with cash, I just sell some metals. It’s worked great for the last 2 decades! New cars and boats and shit like that is for idiots, Everyone I know at work that lives like that ate a big shit sandwich in 08-09 when work for us crashed. I not only survived just fine I paid for solar school while I was out of work too. These fools are now doing the same dumb assed crap as before now too. Some people are just too stupid to have currency…
There are extra jobs out there, but there are also hundreds of people going after each. Your chances of getting one, therefore, are slim.