Thing is, since financial institutions are intertwined, the location of the buyers doesn't necessary dictate where the most exposure is. I'd be far more interested in the locations of the financial institutions holding the subprime loans and the potential issues of those institutions failing.

Creation of the Federal Reserve system.



Most new vehicle purchases don't pay full retail price either.

This post was edited by Santara on Nov 10 2019 04:49pm

the info could prove beneficial, but i think that info should also be divided into state-by-state brackets. only lumping them for a general average.
you'd have to separate the practices of banks vs credit unions vs all the auto-lenders as well. again only lumping for an average.

in short, i agree there could be regulation to the industry. however, i largely support a state largely dealing with it's own issues instead of implementing regulations on everyone.
(not implying you have an opposite approach)

That's indubitably impacted how businesses function. How do you feel that type of debt was normalized to the individual level?

We have the ECB, our equivalent to the Federal Reserve. Yet our society is way less based on debt. Surely that cannot be the only factor.

we spent all our coins on slaves, you guys kept the coins. then we lost our slaves to some dumb new law but you guys still got to keep the coins.

pretty sure that's how american debt and Dutch wealth was created.

Comsumer debt fueled overconsumption. Discouragement of savings. The basket of goods that the official inflation figures most closely resembles the spending habits of a wage earner at the 75th percentile. Food and energy, which consume disproportionate shares of the poor's incomes, are purposefully excluded from measuring "core" inflation.



The ECB's ability to print money is less than the Fed's. Your societies accept greater levels of taxation to cover your profligate spending.

You don't feel it's the other way around? That overconsumption fuels consumer debt?

What do you think caused this trend? Do you think the existence of the Federal Reserve was sufficient, or do you believe there were more/different factors in play for the personal debt situation we see today?

There was a 'cash for clunkers' program that impacted the used car pool supply, thus impacting prices. People buying in the years following shouldered the burden by buying a new car, or over-valued used one.

Would be nice if cars were made by the KISS principle. My new 14' Impreza is great, but the 98' manual Forester is a beast and easy as hell to fix and find parts for. You gotta buy quality no matter used or new.

This post was edited by RedFromWinter on Nov 12 2019 12:02pm

I believe there would be balance if fiat's inflation were honestly accounted, or was tied to gold. Without the tie to a solid baseline, people holding the ever-increasingly devaluing paper are better served financially trying to acquire appreciable assets. The poor living paycheck to paycheck are unable to even do that. We were somewhat alright until Nixon closed the gold window, but with nothing appreciable flowing to the poor, the wealth gap explodes. The middle class keeps up (with the Jones) by financing, because saving is penalized.

I lay the cause squarely at the feet of the death of Bretton Woods.