Forbes has written up their surprise in the news that most Americans are having terrible times financially. They realize that months ago reports were put out showing that the overwhelming majority of Americans did not have even $1,000 in savings (for a rainy day as financial rags like to call it). But with Bankrate did a consumer survey to find out how people were doing and, more importantly, ask those people to contemplate the terrifying prospect of incurring an unexpected expense (i.e. medical, car, damage). After reiterating that most people didn’t have any money, the new results were unsurprising.
Nearly 4 in 10 respondents, 37%, say they would pay for an unexpected expense with savings, Bankrate's survey found. That's about the same as December 2014, when 38% of people answered the same way.
Nearly a quarter of people, 23%, reported they would pay for an emergency by reducing spending on other things.
"Let's give everyone credit for that. 60% are taking grown-up responsibility for the expense," says Robert Fragasso, chairman and CEO at Fragasso Financial Advisors in Pittsburgh.
“Grown-up responsibility”? Really? I’ll posit this—most people’s credit is shot to shit and they can’t put things on a card. Robert Fragasso wasn’t asked about whether or not 99 percent of the people in his finance world were taking “grown-up responsibility” for bankrupting our economy, but I’m guessing that his statements about that would be a tad less condescending in tone.
What these numbers mean is that if, God forbid you have to replace two tires on your car and pay your registration, and suddenly your school wants you to fork out 50 bucks in a fundraiser (a fundraiser that only exists because your school is underfunded), you could be in serious financial straits. Forget about an actual real emergency, like appendicitis or a fire or a car accident. Back to Forbes!
If all of the above sounds like doom and gloom, there is a bit of a silver lining here: 23% of Bankrate respondents said they’d pay for a $500 or $1,000 emergency by cutting back on non-essential spending, like eating out at restaurants and buying coffee from a coffee shop rather than home brewing. This indicates that there’s a bit of elasticity in people’s budgets.
Yay! There’s elasticity in people’s budgets! So all of you guys stop living la vida loca and start brownbagging it! God is gold and most of us don’t deserve to have what super smart and kind people like Donald Trump or Ted Cruz have.