Posted on 04/12/2017 6:44:17 AM PDT by pabianice
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Fifty-three percent of U.S. households with at least $1,000 of financial resources had hardship while experiencing a financial shock in 2015, according to a report from Pew Charitable Trusts.
A financial shock is defined as an expense such as a car repair, home expense, hospital visit, or a sudden loss of income, which comes unexpectedly and households usually do not budget for.
In 2014, 56 percent of households incurred one of these unexpected expenses, and in 2015, which is the latest data available, that percentage dropped slightly to 53 percent.
"In both years, the typical family spent almost half-a-month's income to cover its most expensive shock, with a median cost of $2,000," the report said. "In 2015, half of respondents said their most expensive shocks made it hard to cover regular expenses..."
(Excerpt) Read more at freebeacon.com ...
Obamacare is one of the top offenders.
From the article. Frankly, I'm surprised that the 'fault' was not attributed to global warming, climate change, or President Trump. To my mind, this whole debacle started much earlier. Around the time Ubama was first inaugurated. It was never lost on me that the day that SOB was inaugurated the average gas price in the US was $1.68/gallon. I never saw that number ever again.
I sure as hell did!........................
Pretty low bar for financial shock. It’s like the “starvation in America” stories where those who eat rice and beans on the 30th and 31st count among the starving.
AGREED!
We were and are an Obamcare victim.
Based on the definition of what they are calling a ‘shock’ - I think it is overbroad and basically just part of life.
‘...defined as an expense such as a car repair, home expense, hospital visit, or a sudden loss of income...’
I would be interested to see what the numbers would be by category from that one might be able to discern something.
The simple fact is that the more something costs, the more it can be taxed by government.
What is deemed good healthcare now, was considered terrible insurance before Obamacare.
Well, you get what you paid for — the equivalent “silver plans” a few years ago were considered catastrophic coverage and were dirt cheap. Now those “dirt cheap” plans cost 2x or 3x or 4x under Obamacare.
And this is how they hide the rise in premiums and the Democrats try to claim that premiums haven't risen that much — under astronomically high deductibles — which means that value has suffered tremendously!
Unfortunately, the masses are too stupid to realize this.
People need financial education. Too many people don’t handle their money very well.
Too many don’t understand how to save money, don’t understand how credit cards can suck your money away, etc.
People need to learn to plan for emergencies.
People need to learn that cars break down, roofs leak, and that you might lose your job.
Too many don’t plan ahead or think, what would they do if something bad happens.
I know people who make plenty of money, but whose credit cards are always maxed out. They're always moaning about being broke, but take vacations to places like Hawaii (and you can keep that place), Cancun, Aruba, etc. They send their mediocre kids to expensive private schools. They, for the most part, don't keep vehicles any longer than it takes to pay them off and in many cases don't even wait that long just roll the unpaid balance into the next car loan.
In some cases financial problems are indeed caused by bad luck, but the majority are caused by lack of fiscal good sense.
That’s a meaningless statistic. I got in a car wreck in 2015, and it messed up my 2016 money plans what with a sudden car payment that wasn’t there. So I guess that puts me in that group even though all is well. Yes people have bad things happen, and it costs money, and even people with their finances well arranged go “oh crap” for a minute when things need to get re-arranged. BFD.
I kept my job, but my buying power sure went down!
In 2015 I was recovering from my Obama layoff.
It seems that any month or few months in which we do NOT have one of those type expenses is when I find it “shocking”. HA
Oh please, there are no Obamacare victims.
Even Ivanka knows selective compassion, only count the free subsidies of the takers’ hand. The misery of the makers’ hand is ignored, so do gooders can show fake compassion.
/s
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