Families go deep in debt to maintain a middle-class lifestyle

Actually that's not true anymore, at least where I live. My 15 year old had a class where they explained in pretty good detail how loans work, how one would go about getting a loan without getting ripped off, and how much one would have to pay back. I was very pleased when I saw homework related to this.

I don't know which percentage of kids will absorb (let alone retain) this, but they can no longer claim that society "fails" to teach them.

A quick search shows we still require personal finance to be taught the senior year of high school.

Don't rely on this

If you want to become acutely aware of this, buy a rental property and see how close to just breaking even it usually is as a financial investment.

In addition, “we robustly find that new H-1Bs cause no significant increase in firm employment. New H-1Bs substantially and statistically significantly crowd out median employment of other workers,” they continue. This result conflicts with the widely repeated claim that foreign workers create American jobs, which is based, as we have previously reported, partly on the work of economist Madeline Zavodny of Agnes Scott College in Decatur, Georgia. Furthermore, “[o]ur results are consistent with the possibility that H-1B and non-H-1B workers are perfect substitutes. This is notable in light of frequent claims that H-1Bs have unique skills that cannot easily be obtained elsewhere.”

The authors of this “important” study “have done an exhaustive analysis, given the data available, and they have better data than anyone to date, best I can tell,” says labor force expert Hal Salzman of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, by e-mail. “And their findings are consistent with all the other analyses that were done competently—and consistent with what the companies themselves state is the function of H-1B (to lower wage costs and raise profits).”"

https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2015/05/economists-h-1b-v... (Economists: H-1B visas suppress wages)

https://gspp.berkeley.edu/assets/uploads/research/pdf/h1b.pd... (The Effects of High-Skilled Immigration Policy on Firms: Evidence from Visa Lotteries)

Wait, what? Where have you been? I mean, 9/10 is a fraction, so yeah… but I’ve been in software development for 25 years across five different geographic regions (of the United States) and I’m usually the _only_ non-Indian non-H1B software developer there.

That is such a back-breaking expense when your employer is not footing most of the bill that basically all of my other expenses are insignificant by comparison.

Thankfully, I think we're finally nearing critical mass of people who realize health insurance in the US is completely fucked, that something has to change before long (a decade maybe?).

considering that it is the tech companies most involved in hiring h1b. it is not surprising that they are the main entities pushing this lie.

> Extremely low unemployment

This is accurate, if you measure U3 -- which is short term unemployed, as measured by surveys required to get short term unemployment insurance. If you measure the labor participation rate (U6), it shows something less than "extremely low unemployment".

That said, I think it's largely a problem with the candidates/employees and their mismatch between company expectations. Many unemployed have already filed for disability, so it's illegal for them to apply to work again. Many are convicted felons and have a criminal record which makes them unemployable in many careers. Many have life problems (learning disability, extreme substance abuse, illiterate, can't hold down a job, live in a region with a death of job openings and unable/unwilling to move, caring for a dependent, etc).

Actually I think that works to your advantage. There’s a class of hiring managers who figure that if you went to college in America but didn’t go to Harvard, Yale or MIT, you’re not qualified to tie your own shoes. They don’t know anything about foreign universities, though, so they figure one is as good as any other.

[EDIT] which is to say that even without a car payment, you better be saving the equivalent of at least half a car payment a month, or you're probably falling behind.

I think there are three classes of interest rates: - teaser rates (very low, but only in the first x months, then they reset to a standard rate) - standard rate for decent credit - default-risk rate -- card holders are moved to this rate by a clause in their contract if they default on any credit obligation on their credit report or if they miss a certain number of payments on the "due by" date.

I'm using my own terminology; no idea what industry jargon is for these.

People don't naturally pay the minimum for each necessary bill and never buy anything else. They have a stream of money and tend to spend it on what they see their costs are now.

Some adults are cognizant of future planning and are detailed with their budgets (past, present, and future), but I suspect most are too tired from working + raising kids to spend the extra mental effort to budget carefully and stick to it.

So that leaves the optional retirement and healthcare savings, plus commuting/gas (which may have some overlap.) And again I was going really high on the debt payoff estimates, groceries, and hopefully child care (though I have seen even worse.)

But yes if have student loans, but then choose to take on a car loan and a mortgage payment that stretches you thin, you start to have to choose between savings, debt pay off and fun things including eating out and more expensive forms of entertainment.

The snapshot isn't the complete picture, but they definitely look like they are in a perfectly reasonably situation, and they could have those optional debts paid down relatively quickly, which would massively ease up their budget.

Promo rates are the bank's marketing department paying to hook in the card holder on the probability that they will use the card for a long time. The standard rate largely factors in the cost of doing transactions (shared with the merchant percentage) and covering the risk of default.

The 14-18% rates go to 24%+ if the card holder moves to a higher risk class (recently defaulted on another card, missing payment dates, etc).

On a side note, I think all the above are excellent ways of debt.

Right now you can get a mortgage for under 4%. Mortgages typically do not compound interest. So it makes more sense to dump your savings into one of many savings that pay a similar interest rate or higher & do compound interest.

Many car dealers have 0% interest if you want to buy your car & not lease.

Of course any education debt that gets you a salary much higher than the debt makes sense as well.

Why can't you just support policies that help other people without worrying about yourself?

Is 'I had it bad so everyone else should, too' really where you want to live?

So many garbage people that can't see the forest for the trees. Think of how many more customers with disposable income you could have (if you wanted to start a business) if so many people in this country weren't deep in debt.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_Aid_and_Fiscal_Respons...

https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/which-households-hold-most-...

Which means a student loan cancellation would help the middle class the most since student debt would be a higher percentage of their income and the bottom 75% hold 66% (the majority) of the debt.

Tradesmen can be forgiven for not understanding macroeconomic policy though, which is why it isn't their role to set it, just as I don't ask an economist to weld a pipeline together. I can still respect the roles of both practitioners regardless.