The whole tone of the article is very dismissive. It's important to remember no real structural reforms were done after the 2008 crisis, and the underlying problem (the principal-agent problem in public financial institutions and their dealings in risk) remains. And now with even more leverage and greater exposure to even more complex derivatives and financial instruments. There's a reason people are behaving like this.

It's also either misinformed, or misleading. A statement like "Shunning debt and spending less can be good for one family's finances. When hundreds of millions do it together, it can starve the global economy." is false. Engaging in deficit spending in ones family would be a great idea if you had an unlimited line of infinite forgiveable-borrowing at 0% from a reserve bank. Similarly saving in the global economy could create large amounts of spare capital that would drive investment in real productive goods and services with healthy returns, if your savings investments weren't being front-run by a central bank with the legal right to print currency.

The investment/reward money pricing mechanism (interest rates) are beyond broken, they are corrupted. People saying this were once branded insane, and then libor was revealed. It goes on. This being said, the underlying movement by people leaves me with hope. It's good to see a lot of people paying down their debt, saving their money, choosing to take the financial medicine now, rather than later when the flavour will be even more bitter and possibly deadly.