9 ms·

Do you have any sense of how people are managing? I sort of assumed that people _must_ be receiving money because there's no way Americans in the lower deciles

Do you have any sense of how people are managing? I sort of assumed that people _must_ be receiving money because there's no way Americans in the lower deciles of savings would be able to pay their bills consistently without work or stimulus. If there's no stimulus and no work, how are they paying bills? Is it on credit? Was there actually some savings?

claudeganon 6y ago
People are coasting on tiny savings, eviction freezes, not paying bills, and moving in with their friends or families. Or at least my friends anyway. The fall/winter is going to be an absolute disaster because you can’t fix anything about the economy without getting the pandemic under control, which a large percentage of our leaders in the US have decided they have no obligation to do.
- option 6y ago
  Please remember to vote based on candidates’ record not FB/Youtube ads
  - claudeganon 6y ago
    I don’t know what this is supposed to mean, but this failure extends across both parties in the United States. The refusal by politicians to take on Capital owners is pushing people into homelessness, loss of healthcare, or danger in low wage jobs, all of which further exacerbate the pandemic. The mainstream of the Democratic Party has advanced little that would address any of this, mostly quibbling over means testing income supports and lurching right. And we can just look at that state of the pandemic in the US to know what the other side thinks we should be doing.
    - Answerawake 6y ago
      This is what boggles my mind. We had progressive candidates running this cycle that were outright commiting to trying something different. Yet the majority of the voter base ran towards people promising the same strategy as previous administrations. Either this crisis is magnified on HN and the majority of the voter base is unaffected by the pandemic or something else is going on.
      - claudeganon 6y ago
        The Democratic party made the correct bet that they could use their media apparatus to discredit progressive candidates, get away with cheating in Iowa, and use Obama to get the other moderates to concede with promises of internal advancement. It was corrupt and repugnant, but a strategically sound approach to make sure they're headed on the ticket by a center right leader (which their donor base demands).
        Answerawake 6y ago
        As someone who volunteered for multiple campaigns this cycle, I saw this clearly. But I also see most people that I have met on my travels just seem to be checked out, even if they vote. I think this is the bigger problem. The previous cycles have already just turned people off from thinking they can do massive change. Even with a record number of volunteers and supporters with a campaign like Bernie, it still wasn't enough numbers. I often wonder how painful things will have to get to enact some change with the checked out masses. What will happen if we reach that point?
        Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
        >What will happen if we reach that point? More riots, looting, autonomous zones, and probably hostile us army deployments stateside.
        babycake 6y ago
        Don't forget that the Democratic party has something called Super Delegates, which basically blocks any candidate they don't agree with, even if the candidate won the popular vote. If Trump ran as Democrat, he wouldn't be president today due to this. Also, we shouldn't forget that Michael Bloomberg decided to run last-minute as a Democrat, with the Democrat party changing the applicant rules so that he could specifically run. The whole political apparatus is entirely corrupt. I'm not sure voting helps at this point. We have a massive amount of people who are on the last of their savings, with no unemployment benefit coming their way to help out. This may be the beginning of a revolution, if people are angry enough, maybe.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
londons_explore 6y ago
I have no data to back this up, but I would guess with interest rates at record lows and massive amounts of stimulus money with nowhere to go, getting a personal loan is rather easy right now...
ethanwillis 6y ago
I can really only give my personal viewpoint of it. But for me personally I just have not been paying my mortgage only because I was lucky enough to have a government backed mortgage loan where I could tell the bank "tough shit" until the end of the year. Also there have been temporary measures in place for things like utilities, ISPs, mobile phone plans etc. where people will keep accruing obligations on their bills without the services being cutoff. However it seems that those programs are about to come to an end. Locally where I live the utility service here said they will start doing cutoffs in August. So I think it's a mixture of some amount of savings, some access to credit, and then a kicking of the can down the road for a few months. So my guess overall is that basically we are simply delaying the problem in a bunch of different ways. But at the end of that delay is going to be a lot of economic hurt when those bills actually come due.
- wronglebowski 6y ago
  In my experience access to credit besides credit cards has been extremely limited. My wife and I looked into several different personal or short term loan options for our upcoming IVF cycle(approx 30k$). Most banks have either stopped offering them completely or made the requirements much harder. The two of us with credit scores of 750+, combined 200k annual income and little existing debt couldn't get approved for a simple 5k$ loan. I fear for those that have a more dire need for the cash than we do.
  - causalmodels 6y ago
    This reminds me of a little trick I learned while working in finance. If you have bad credit but have over $1,000 in cash, go and get an unsecured loan for roughly 90% of your cash on hand. Ideally the terms should have a negligible or nonexistent prepayment penalty. Once you have the loan, repay it within 2-3 business days. Rinse and repeat until your credit score starts to improve.
  - kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
    Is there a reason why you can't get by on $170k?
paulmd 6y ago
Roughly 1 in 3 american households are behind on their housing payments. Most states (and all federally backed mortgages) have temporarily suspended evictions so the short answer is that people in financial distress dropped that expense, which is usually the single largest on most people's budgets (for low-income people this can often be 50% or more of take-home depending on the city - yes, the rule of thumb is that it shouldn't be higher than 25% but you simply can't find affordable housing in a lot of areas). However that one eventually is going to come due because the federal mortgage eviction moratorium doesn't prevent you from going in default on your mortgage, it only prevents evictions. The 3-month timer is still running and as soon as the moratorium on evictions is lifted, they can kick you out immediately. So as soon as that lets up in a month or two there's going to be a massive surge in evictions in states that do not go out of their way to keep evictions suspended. (and in fact this is probably a snowballing problem, the longer this crisis goes unchecked and the worse the economic pain gets, the more people that will be in default and the bigger the difficulty of getting "back to normal". Furthermore at some point that shit starts rolling back uphill economically, banks turned your mortgage into financial products and you not paying is cutting off the income of someone else, and in fact there is an eventual risk of a 2008-style crisis occurring on top of all the current problems if we get into a situation where people are defaulting en-masse.)
- _wldu 6y ago
  Almost 40% of homes in America are owned free and clear (no mortgage). https://www.forbes.com/sites/brendarichardson/2019/07/26/nearly-40-of-homes-in-the-us-are-free-and-clear-of-a-mortgage/#1ff0b48947c2 https://www.forbes.com/sites/brendarichardson/2019/07/26/nea...
  - dopamean 6y ago
    I wonder how many of those are occupied by renters.
    - _wldu 6y ago
      I'm not sure. I posted that to point out the danger of these statistics. We have to be careful. People can tell whatever kind of story they want to tell (at either extreme) and cite the same statistics. Mark Twain made this quip widely known, and it is relevant: "Lies. Damned Lies. And statistics"
JohnTHaller 6y ago
25% of folks in NYC, the largest rental market in the US, haven't made rent payments since March. NYC has put a hold on evictions, but their owed rent is still building up. The majority of Americans weren't able to cover an unexpected $500 expense before the pandemic hit. The full depth of how bad this is going to get hasn't hit most people nor has it hit the markets.
- causalmodels 6y ago
  The blanket eviction moratorium has expired in NYC. You can now be brought to court for failure to pay, but if you can prove financial hardship they can't kick you out. This is a fairly substantial burden. I'm afraid what will happen since people can't afford rent let alone legal representation.

claudeganon 6y ago

People are coasting on tiny savings, eviction freezes, not paying bills, and moving in with their friends or families. Or at least my friends anyway. The fall/winter is going to be an absolute disaster because you can’t fix anything about the economy without getting the pandemic under control, which a large percentage of our leaders in the US have decided they have no obligation to do.

option 6y ago
Please remember to vote based on candidates’ record not FB/Youtube ads
- claudeganon 6y ago
  I don’t know what this is supposed to mean, but this failure extends across both parties in the United States. The refusal by politicians to take on Capital owners is pushing people into homelessness, loss of healthcare, or danger in low wage jobs, all of which further exacerbate the pandemic. The mainstream of the Democratic Party has advanced little that would address any of this, mostly quibbling over means testing income supports and lurching right. And we can just look at that state of the pandemic in the US to know what the other side thinks we should be doing.
  - Answerawake 6y ago
    This is what boggles my mind. We had progressive candidates running this cycle that were outright commiting to trying something different. Yet the majority of the voter base ran towards people promising the same strategy as previous administrations. Either this crisis is magnified on HN and the majority of the voter base is unaffected by the pandemic or something else is going on.
    - claudeganon 6y ago
      The Democratic party made the correct bet that they could use their media apparatus to discredit progressive candidates, get away with cheating in Iowa, and use Obama to get the other moderates to concede with promises of internal advancement. It was corrupt and repugnant, but a strategically sound approach to make sure they're headed on the ticket by a center right leader (which their donor base demands).
      - Answerawake 6y ago
        As someone who volunteered for multiple campaigns this cycle, I saw this clearly. But I also see most people that I have met on my travels just seem to be checked out, even if they vote. I think this is the bigger problem. The previous cycles have already just turned people off from thinking they can do massive change. Even with a record number of volunteers and supporters with a campaign like Bernie, it still wasn't enough numbers. I often wonder how painful things will have to get to enact some change with the checked out masses. What will happen if we reach that point?
        Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
        >What will happen if we reach that point? More riots, looting, autonomous zones, and probably hostile us army deployments stateside.
      - babycake 6y ago
        Don't forget that the Democratic party has something called Super Delegates, which basically blocks any candidate they don't agree with, even if the candidate won the popular vote. If Trump ran as Democrat, he wouldn't be president today due to this. Also, we shouldn't forget that Michael Bloomberg decided to run last-minute as a Democrat, with the Democrat party changing the applicant rules so that he could specifically run. The whole political apparatus is entirely corrupt. I'm not sure voting helps at this point. We have a massive amount of people who are on the last of their savings, with no unemployment benefit coming their way to help out. This may be the beginning of a revolution, if people are angry enough, maybe.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

londons_explore 6y ago

I have no data to back this up, but I would guess with interest rates at record lows and massive amounts of stimulus money with nowhere to go, getting a personal loan is rather easy right now...

ethanwillis 6y ago

I can really only give my personal viewpoint of it. But for me personally I just have not been paying my mortgage only because I was lucky enough to have a government backed mortgage loan where I could tell the bank "tough shit" until the end of the year. Also there have been temporary measures in place for things like utilities, ISPs, mobile phone plans etc. where people will keep accruing obligations on their bills without the services being cutoff. However it seems that those programs are about to come to an end. Locally where I live the utility service here said they will start doing cutoffs in August. So I think it's a mixture of some amount of savings, some access to credit, and then a kicking of the can down the road for a few months. So my guess overall is that basically we are simply delaying the problem in a bunch of different ways. But at the end of that delay is going to be a lot of economic hurt when those bills actually come due.

wronglebowski 6y ago
In my experience access to credit besides credit cards has been extremely limited. My wife and I looked into several different personal or short term loan options for our upcoming IVF cycle(approx 30k$). Most banks have either stopped offering them completely or made the requirements much harder. The two of us with credit scores of 750+, combined 200k annual income and little existing debt couldn't get approved for a simple 5k$ loan. I fear for those that have a more dire need for the cash than we do.
- causalmodels 6y ago
  This reminds me of a little trick I learned while working in finance. If you have bad credit but have over $1,000 in cash, go and get an unsecured loan for roughly 90% of your cash on hand. Ideally the terms should have a negligible or nonexistent prepayment penalty. Once you have the loan, repay it within 2-3 business days. Rinse and repeat until your credit score starts to improve.
- kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  Is there a reason why you can't get by on $170k?

paulmd 6y ago

Roughly 1 in 3 american households are behind on their housing payments. Most states (and all federally backed mortgages) have temporarily suspended evictions so the short answer is that people in financial distress dropped that expense, which is usually the single largest on most people's budgets (for low-income people this can often be 50% or more of take-home depending on the city - yes, the rule of thumb is that it shouldn't be higher than 25% but you simply can't find affordable housing in a lot of areas). However that one eventually is going to come due because the federal mortgage eviction moratorium doesn't prevent you from going in default on your mortgage, it only prevents evictions. The 3-month timer is still running and as soon as the moratorium on evictions is lifted, they can kick you out immediately. So as soon as that lets up in a month or two there's going to be a massive surge in evictions in states that do not go out of their way to keep evictions suspended. (and in fact this is probably a snowballing problem, the longer this crisis goes unchecked and the worse the economic pain gets, the more people that will be in default and the bigger the difficulty of getting "back to normal". Furthermore at some point that shit starts rolling back uphill economically, banks turned your mortgage into financial products and you not paying is cutting off the income of someone else, and in fact there is an eventual risk of a 2008-style crisis occurring on top of all the current problems if we get into a situation where people are defaulting en-masse.)

_wldu 6y ago
Almost 40% of homes in America are owned free and clear (no mortgage). https://www.forbes.com/sites/brendarichardson/2019/07/26/nearly-40-of-homes-in-the-us-are-free-and-clear-of-a-mortgage/#1ff0b48947c2 https://www.forbes.com/sites/brendarichardson/2019/07/26/nea...
- dopamean 6y ago
  I wonder how many of those are occupied by renters.
  - _wldu 6y ago
    I'm not sure. I posted that to point out the danger of these statistics. We have to be careful. People can tell whatever kind of story they want to tell (at either extreme) and cite the same statistics. Mark Twain made this quip widely known, and it is relevant: "Lies. Damned Lies. And statistics"

JohnTHaller 6y ago

25% of folks in NYC, the largest rental market in the US, haven't made rent payments since March. NYC has put a hold on evictions, but their owed rent is still building up. The majority of Americans weren't able to cover an unexpected $500 expense before the pandemic hit. The full depth of how bad this is going to get hasn't hit most people nor has it hit the markets.

causalmodels 6y ago
The blanket eviction moratorium has expired in NYC. You can now be brought to court for failure to pay, but if you can prove financial hardship they can't kick you out. This is a fairly substantial burden. I'm afraid what will happen since people can't afford rent let alone legal representation.