Looks like this article is trying to reconcile the multiple conflicting studies on this topic, especially around some of the wording of the questions. Here's t

Looks like this article is trying to reconcile the multiple conflicting studies on this topic, especially around some of the wording of the questions. Here's the key takeaway: "Many of the people who have $400 or more available to them likely have already earmarked that money for another obligation (and so, in other words, the cash isn’t really available to them)." So if you're not in a good position, what little money you have in savings is already going to go somewhere else by the end of the month, and adding an expense on top of that would require an additional debt of some kind. It's still not clear to me, though, how credit cards factor into this since many people put any significant expense on their credit card rather than writing checks/handing over cash.