I'm also European and I know, within my own country, one group of people who would fin it completely normal to buy TVs and furniture on credit and another group

I'm also European and I know, within my own country, one group of people who would fin it completely normal to buy TVs and furniture on credit and another group that wouldn't. The former is low income and the latter is high income. People in low income communities find it very normal to buy on credit, often allowing you to buy now, pay in a year. My friends from higher income communities think this is a strange thing to do. What I'm trying to say is that some of these customs might not depend on country, but even on groups within countries. On a related note, I've personally noticed that here in the Netherlands, there's a pretty clear split between low income and high income, very tightly connected with education. In 'High School', lower and higher education are split in different classes and often different schools. So friendships are often formed within these groups and not across them (sports begin the exception). Because of this, a lot of people think something is normal in the Netherlands, but it's actually normal in their environment.