Free Republic

American households now have an average of $10,170 credit card debt, as record numbers say they are worried about being cut off from access to loans. Data from the New York Federal Reserve shows nationwide credit card debt swelled by $43 billion in the second quarter of the year - the second largest increase on record. *** But some states are faring much worse than others as households in Hawaii have the highest debt currently, according to fresh analysis by WalletHub. Families in the Aloha state have $10,637 in credit card loans on average. It was followed by Alaska, California...

In a study earlier this year (Abdelrahman and Oliveira 2023), we examined household saving patterns since the onset of the pandemic recession. Our study showed that households rapidly accumulated unprecedented levels of excess savings—defined as the difference between actual savings and the pre-recession trend—relative to previous recessions. Our analysis suggested that some $500 billion of the $2.1 trillion in total accumulated excess savings remained in the aggregate economy by March 2023. Since then, data revisions show noticeable changes in household disposable income and consumption, while new data releases indicate that consumer spending picked up in the second quarter. Our updated...