DSNews: Job Loss Would Make 1 in 3 Homeless

And by “encouraging,” I mean that the last thirty years of insane financialization and ridiculous consumption is making itself evident everywhere you turn. While the use of “homeless” in the article is a touch misleading, it still paints a pretty yucky picture:

And this:

Chalk this up to too many folks borrowing for (or against) homes they couldn’t really afford, and it logically follows that these same households couldn’t build up savings even if they wanted to do so. Throw a dead-weight economy on top of it, and you have the makings of a mighty tenuous situation for a lot of Americans.

Bankrate: August Financial Security Index

I always enjoy seeing how people feel about their savings (or lack thereof), and according to Bankrate, 47 percent of Americans say they are less comfortable with their savings than a year ago. You have to think that teetering stock markets play a large role here; couple that with all the other negative news items which have driven headlines lately, and you have a recipe for a consumer-based economy Rut Ro.

With similar surveys indicating that 42 percent of us live paycheck-to-paycheck, and half of us would have difficulty coming up with $2,000 in a pinch … well, no surprises here.

CareerBuilder: 2011 Financial Survey

And, of workers who make six figures, CareerBuilder found that 14 percent reported living paycheck to paycheck, and 6 percent reported that they were unable to make ends meet every month.

CareerBuilder also asked the roughly 5,200 workers surveyed what they would or wouldn’t be willing to give up if push came to shove. Percentages of workers who “absolutely would not do without” certain items were as follows:

• Internet Connection — 56 Percent
• Driving — 46 Percent
• Mobile Phone — 42 Percent
• Cable TV — 27 Percent
• Eating Out — 11 Percent

A full 21 percent of workers reported either dipping into savings or reducing retirement contributions within the last year in order to get by.

What Happened to Last Year’s Numbers?

Last year, I noted that CareerBuilder’s survey found 7 in 10 workers living paycheck to paycheck. Curiously, this year’s survey says that last year’s survey found not the oh-my-gosh rate of 7 in 10, but rather 4.3 in 10. And I see that Press Release 784 (my source/link) has disappeared from CareerBuilder’s archives. I don’t know if their methodology has changed, or if they’re now running their numbers through the Federal Agency of Enforced Statistical Correctness before releasing them. Gotta wonder just what went on, though.

WSJ: Nearly Half of Americans ‘Financially Fragile’

According to the study, roughly half of Americans reported that they “probably” or “definitely” could not come up with $2,000 if needed within 30 days.

From the WSJ:

Other recent, similar surveys have told us that more than 3/4 of us live paycheck-to-paycheck, and 27 percent of us have no personal savings. So it’s not as if this WSJ article’s story is a surprise.

PR Newswire: More Americans Report No Personal or Retirement Savings

Amazing, I know. Even though our economy just surged through a dotGov-sponsored Recovery Summer™, it seems that as of November, 2010, fewer of us reported having any personal or retirement savings.

Here’s one of the survey’s more salient points to consider, if you’re a Gen Xer (as I am):

When one in three 34-to-45-year-olds reports having no personal savings, then you know our consume-it-all economic setup is working precisely as designed. And as one of the accompanying tables shows, the same percentage of Gen Xers report having no retirement savings.

Couple this sort of data with that from other late-2010 surveys — CareerBuilder, for instance, found that 77 percent of us survive paycheck-to-paycheck, even $100k earners — and the picture that emerges is downright scary.

Slate: Why We Can’t Ignore Income Inequality

Once there, scroll down about one-third of the way through the page. You’ll see a text-box tool labeled “Where Do I Stand?”; that’s what you’re looking for.

Enter your ZIP code and your income in the boxes provided, and you’ll get to find out just how your income ranks against that of your neighbors, as well as against your state’s median income.

FWIW, according to this tool, my income is almost double the average income of my particular ZIP code. I’m not surprised, as Lisa and I still live in the first home we ever bought. In that regard, at least, I think that “living below your means” really shows up in data like this. No chasing the Joneses in our household!

Per Bloomberg, roughly one in eight Americans will participate in the program during the upcoming fiscal year.

Chart source data here and here. Ugly spreadsheet here.

Now this is some encouraging news … if you enjoy financial distress.

If we’re to believe CareerBuilder’s survey of 4,500 U.S. workers — and I don’t really have a great reason not to — then roughly 77 percent of us describe ourselves as living paycheck to paycheck:

CareerBuilder: Nearly 8 in 10 Living Paycheck to Paycheck

From the article:

Ouch. Earlier this year, I mentioned that more and more $100k workers were living paycheck to paycheck, too.

For those of you who like charts, here’s one with a bit more data from the CareerBuilder survey:

Pretty great, ain’t it, that more people were willing to dip into savings and retirement accounts than were willing to cancel their cable TV and other subscriptions. What the hell are people thinking?

And since I’ve already got Excel open, I might as well update this running chart while I’m at it:

If you’re interested in comparisons, I covered last year’s CareerBuilder survey here.

See the glaring disconnect in the first two items? If fifty-six percent of Americans think the government should stay “altogether” out of the mortgage market, but seventy-nine percent want the mortgage-interest deduction to continue, then an awful lot of people have an awfully shallow view of what “government participation” means.

If you don’t think that the mortgage-interest deduction amounts to a subsidy for homeowners, and therefore, is the very essence of “government participation” in the market, then you’re nuts. Take away that deduction, and see what happens to home prices. Mortgage qualification standards are based upon that federal tax deduction being there, effectively “helping” people make their house payments. If the deduction were to go away, qualification standards would necessarily tighten. Joe and Jane Sixpack wouldn’t be able to qualify for as high a mortgage payment as they could previously, as more of their gross income would now be going to taxes. Thus, over time, home prices would decline.

For this survey to mean much, someone really ought to define “altogether.” Because to me, that’d mean the dissolution of Fannie, Freddie, and the FHA, as well as the removal of the mortgage-interest tax deduction. But that wasn’t what the Rasmussen respondents inferred, or were told. Obviously.

What an idea, huh? Get rid of Fannie, Freddie, the FHA — who between them control 90 percent of the mortgage market these days — and the sacrosanct mortgage-interest deduction. You want to talk about a full-on house price collapse? That’d do it!

New York Fed: U.S. Credit Conditions and Quarterly Report

Look for the New York Fed to update its nifty Report on Household Debt and Credit every quarter. As of this writing, the first (and latest) report is for 2010 Quarter 2.

Lots of charts there (viewable as JPEG or PDF) for the economics dorks among us!