I think the bottom line is that most of the contributors to that subreddit are young and don't have much life experience, so they parrot the same one-size-fits-

I think the bottom line is that most of the contributors to that subreddit are young and don't have much life experience, so they parrot the same one-size-fits-all financial advice. An example is telling everyone, no matter their circumstances, to always buy used cars and learn how to fix them themselves. They give this advice to rich doctors as well as poor single mothers. It also seems that many of the contributors have had bad experiences with debt, and now treat it as something to be avoided like a cancer. Debt is a useful tool for people who understand money. I remember a thread characterized by total incomprehension in most of the comments when someone said he would rather take a low-interest loan to buy a car than sell some of his stock and pay cash, because selling the stock would have triggered capital gains taxes far greater than the interest he would have paid on the car loan. It's also very common in that subreddit to recommend that people who are in debt should basically live like monks for years, when living in a modest amount of comfort would only prolong repayment by a few months. Giving up your $14.99 monthly Netflix account is not going to make a big dent in your student loans over time -- over a 10-year repayment, that savings will add up to less than $2k. But the commenters there will pile on you if you point that out. The thing that annoys me the most is the way people who have succeeded in tackling their debts are criticized for having high incomes, as though having a high income was something that just happened to them because of luck, rather than being a result of hard work and skill development.