DEBT AND BURIED
Americans charged $605B this year
It’s not happy holidays for thousands of New Yorkers.
The huge surge in total US household debt — now a record $12.96 trillion and a harbinger of recession, some analysts say — is washing across New York with brutal consequences. And the damage is not hard to spot. From extended lines of cashstrapped consumers at New York food pantries to a rise in mentalhealth problems, the latest New York quarterly Fed data paints a dire picture: Household debt has grown by $605 billion in the past 12 months, with $116 billion, or nearly 1 percent, hitting in the latest quarter. Debt is mushrooming everywhere — on mortgages, student loans, auto loans. Credit card debt, meanwhile, has jumped by 3.1 percent in the latest quarter.
“We’ve seen a large increase in credit card debt for the population we are serving in New York,” said Laine Rolong, senior manager at the financial empowerment program at the Food Bank for New York City.
Rolong noted that many food pantries it serves in the city have had to turn hungry people away lately in the face of rising demand for limited emergency food stocks.
One expert says the credit card binge reminds him of the buildup to the financial crisis of 2007 and 2008. And this, say other experts, could be the telltale sign of an imminent recession.
As lenders continue to ratchet up their portfolios, the Fed data shows an increase in credit cards and auto loans moving into delinquency.
Many credit card consumers have already given up the ghost or have had lenders calling them for overdue pay- ments. However, there are more than enough credit card victims to take up the slack.
“I would say this is very similar to what I saw ten years ago — people using their credit cards quite a bit,” said Kevin Gallegos, a senior vice president at Freedom Debt Relief, a debtsettlement company for consumers.
Back then, when total household debt was heading toward a peak of $12.68 trillion (which ended in disaster), debt-burdened consumers were addicted to cards — often those offering a tantalizing zero-percent monthly interest rate for as long as 12 months or more.
That strategy, now back in vogue, often ends in tears as the debt piles up. “By the time the consumer has moved their balances to the fourth card at zero percent, companies eventually cut them off for the next card,” said Gallegos.
The fallout can be dreadful. “We’ve had clients tell us they are on the verge of suicide, their marriages are breaking up, or ‘I don’t have enough to put food on my table,’” said Gallegos. “We hear sad stories all the time.”