| I'm not sure people outright have more money. I think a big part of it is that the average person has access to a lot of credit. Generally the way I suspect it goes is 1. Draw from savings to buy essential goods. 2. Slowly load whatever you can't afford on your credit cards. 3. Get new credit cards before you start missing payments. 4. Load more on your cards. 5. Have nowhere else to go so start taking payday loans. 6. Run out of money. Which is in stark contrast to pre-2000s recessions where access to credit was far more limited. As it is currently, if you've had a credit card, it is incredibly easy to get more and you can get an incredibly large amount of accessible credit. The average american has around 30k USD in available credit (10k for 18-22 and 20k for 23-38 but 30k overall) with only around 5k or less of that utilized on average. That's a lot of money that companies can draw on before consumers pockets are truly empty. https://www.bankrate.com/finance/credit-cards/what-is-the-av... |