Your first link is about credit card debt, and your second link is about a family with no credit. You can't link the two. What point are you trying to make? You

Your first link is about credit card debt, and your second link is about a family with no credit. You can't link the two. What point are you trying to make? You said this: Maybe this goes without saying, but the average family in North America lives well above their means. Rent to own furniture, a leased lexus for the wife and ginormous pickup truck for the office job husband, dinner and drinks out multiple times per week etc. But none of your links actually back that up. If we're trading personal anecdotes, fine, but otherwise you're caricaturing the average family as struggling because of (I would guess based on your implication) stupidity and greed. This doesn't seem to match my experience of the "average" family, but it is common dog whistle language.