By Eric Swanson

The Federal Reserve released its latest preliminary findings of revolving consumer credit, better known as credit card debt.  Credit card debt was down for the month of May by a tremendous 10.5 percent.  This means that we have a lot of people that are also reducing their debt and will relate to you on your financial marathon in beating debt.  Seek them out, learn from each other, and form a relationship with them which can provide motivation when the financial marathon gets tough.

In addition, non-revolving consumer credit went down 1.4 percent in May.

Overall, consumer credit was down a staggering 4.5 percent in May.   This is surprising news because April’s preliminary data was showing that citizens were taking on more debt for the third month in a row.  Nonetheless, citizens beating debt is great news because it means that we are more willing to pay off consumer credit and earn our freedom than struggle under the painful agony of debt.

In addition, these numbers should help the Consumer Debt Clock to continue to go down.

How much more can we, as a nation, continue to drive the clock down?

For more info on the Federal Reserve’s numbers,
click here.

To add the Consumer Debt Clock to your blog/website,
click here.

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

By Eric Swanson

In a surprising move by the leaders of the 20 biggest economies, the G-20 decided to halve national deficits by 2013.

“‘Advanced economies have committed to fiscal plans that will at least halve deficits by 2013 and stabilize or reduce government debt-to-GDP ratios by 2016,’ according to the statement.

World leaders generally sided with cutting spending and raising taxes, despite warnings from President Barack Obama that too much austerity too quickly could choke off the global recovery.” – Associated Press

This is a surprising, but positive turn of events that was not American-led.  It seems the rest of the world understands the need to place limits to a nation’s debt consumption.  It seems the rest of the world understands that unrestrained debt consumption is not sustainable and harmful to the macro-economy.

It wasn’t too long ago that influential leaders understood the pain that too much debt can have on a country:

“I, however, place economy among the first and most important republican virtues, and public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared.” – Thomas Jefferson

However, “history has a way of repeating itself”, especially for those who don’t learn from it, right?

How does this news affect you?  Do you believe that Americans, seeing their leaders take a position of debt reduction, will in turn start reducing more personal debt?  Will this news affect the Consumer Debt Clock?

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

By Eric Swanson

On June 10th, the Federal Reserve released its latest findings on Consumer Debt Outstanding.  In reflection of good personal choices, personal debt went down by 2.4% for the first quarter 2010.  This is amazing because it brings the total personal national debt down to just around $13.5 trillion.  Also, for the first time ever, personal debt did not grow for the seventh quarter in a row.  This decrease was due to a 3.8% drop in household home mortgage debt AND a 1.6% drop in consumer credit.

Maybe we can interpret that as people are starting to turn away from using loans and credit cards as a normal process to make purchases.  Maybe we can interpret this data as people learning about the advantages of using cash and debit cards to make purchases.  Maybe we are starting to pay off our debts to earn our financial freedom.  Maybe we as Americans are getting closer to our Debt Independence Day.  This is all great news!

Since debt is going down, BeatingDebt.org updated the scripts on the Consumer Debt Clock to continue counting down.  Isn’t that wonderful?!

Check out the Consumer Debt Clock that is going down in value and feel free to add it to your website to encourage others to help decrease our consumer debt addiction.

Can we keep up the trend of the clock going down for another quarter?

Can we help it along by paying off our personal debt?

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

By Eric Swanson

The Federal Reserve recently released its latest preliminary findings of revolving consumer credit, better known as credit card debt.  Credit card debt was down for the month of April 2010 by a generous 12 percent.  This could be continued proof of Americans distrust and dislike for credit cards.

Unfortunately, non-revolving consumer credit went up 7.1 percent in April.  That means that the amount of auto loans and student loans went up tremendously.

Therefore, overall consumer credit was up 0.5 percent in April.  This is the third time consumer credit was reported to have gone up this year.

In good news, the Federal Reserve is reporting that consumer credit for Q1 is down 1.6 percent.  This means that we have a lot of people that are also reducing their debt and will relate to you on your financial marathon in beating debt.  Seek them out, learn from each other, and form a relationship with them which can provide motivation when the financial marathon gets tough.

In addition, these numbers should help the Consumer Debt Clock to continue to go down.

How much more can we, as a nation, continue to drive the clock down?

For more info on the Federal Reserve’s numbers,
click here.

To add the Consumer Debt Clock to your blog/website,
click here.

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

By Eric Swanson

The Federal Reserve recently released its latest findings of revolving consumer credit, better known as credit card debt.  Credit card debt was down for the month of March by a small 4.5 percent.

Unfortunately, non-revolving consumer credit went up 3.9 percent in March.  That means that the amount of auto loans and student loans went up tremendously in March.

Overall, consumer credit was up 1.0 percent in March.  This is the second time consumer credit has gone up this year.  So, for the past three recorded months of this year, consumer credit is up 1.2 percent.

Why is consumer credit going up?

What are the motivations to take on more debt?

Does this mean that the frugal citizen has given up on saving more and spending less?

Is there pent-up demand by consumers from a year long recession?

Or are prices getting too high and forcing people to take on debt to survive?

For more info on the Federal Reserve’s numbers,
click here.

To add the Consumer Debt Clock to your blog/website,
click here.

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Past articles about consumer credit going down:

– In Tough Times, US consumers forging new behaviors

– Slapped by recession, can Consumer Nation rethink?

– What are investors waiting for?  Consumers.

By Eric Swanson

In a recent Washington Post article, Joel Achenbach asks a very tough question, “Will the debt break Washington?“.  He brings together some very revealing facts:

“In order to pay the interest and the bill when it comes due, we’ll simply have to issue more IOUs.  That, to me, is Ponzi-like,’ says Bill Gross, a founder of the investment company PIMCO.”

“In addition to running a budget deficit, Washington for years has had a massive deficit of political will.”

“Debt is the grease of Washington legislation; for short-sighted leaders, it is less a political problem than a political solution.  As long as the government can continue borrowing at reasonable rates, citizens can have their tax cuts and government services, and eventually the growing debt becomes someone else’s problem.”

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

By Eric Swanson

The Federal Reserve released its latest findings of revolving consumer credit, better known as credit card debt.  Credit card debt was down for the month of February by a tremendous 13.1 percent.  This is surprising news considering last month credit card debt went up by 2.4 percent.  Nonetheless, seeing our debt levels decrease is continued good confirmation for those who believe in beating debt.  This means that we have a lot of people that are also reducing their debt and will relate to you on your financial marathon in beating debt.  Seek them out, learn from each other, and form a relationship with them which can provide motivation when the financial marathon gets tough.

In addition, non-revolving consumer credit went down 1.6 percent in February.

Overall, consumer credit was down a staggering 5.6 percent in February.   That is great news too because it means that we are more willing to pay off consumer credit and earn our freedom than struggle under the painful agony of debt.

In addition, these numbers should help the Consumer Debt Clock to continue to go down.

How much more can we, as a nation, continue to drive the clock down?

For more info on the Federal Reserve’s numbers,
click here.

To add the Consumer Debt Clock to your blog/website,
click here.

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Teaching Debt Prevention–

On March 11th, the Federal Reserve released its latest findings on Consumer Debt Outstanding.  In reflection of good personal choices, personal debt went down by 1.2% for the fourth quarter 2009.  This is amazing because it brings the total personal national debt down to just around $13.5 trillion.  Also, for the first time ever, personal debt did not grow for the sixth quarter in a row.  This decrease was due to a 0.8% drop in household home mortgage debt AND a 5.8% drop in consumer credit.

Maybe we can interpret that as people are starting to turn away from using loans and credit cards as a normal process to make purchases.  Maybe we can interpret this data as people learning about the advantages of using cash and debit cards to make purchases.  Maybe we are starting to pay off our debts to earn our financial freedom.  This is all great news!

Since debt is going down, BeatingDebt.org updated the scripts on the Consumer Debt Clock to continue counting down.  Isn’t that wonderful?!

Check out the Consumer Debt Clock that is going down in value and feel free to add it to your website to encourage others to help decrease our consumer debt addiction.

Can we keep up the trend of the clock going down for another quarter?

Can we help it along by paying off our personal debt?

BeatingDebt.org

–Convincing People To Stay Away From Debt–

By Eric Swanson

The Federal Reserve released its latest findings of revolving consumer credit, better known as credit card debt.  Credit card debt was down for the month of January by 2.3 percent.

Unfortunately, non-revolving consumer credit went up 5 percent in January.  That means that the amount of auto loans and student loans went up tremendously in January.

Overall, consumer credit was up 2.4 percent in January.   This is the first time consumer credit was up in over a year.

Why did consumer credit finally start going up?

Does this mean that the frugal citizen has given up on saving more and spending less?

Is there pent-up demand by consumers from a year long recession?

Or are prices getting too high and forcing people to take on debt to survive?

The 4th quarter 2009 Consumer Credit results will be coming out in a few days.  These numbers are the figures that drives the Consumer Debt Clock.  It will be interesting to see if consumer debt will continue to go down after this report.

For more info on the Federal Reserve’s numbers,
click here.

To add the Consumer Debt Clock to your blog/website,
click here.

BEATINGDEBT.org

–Convincing People To Stay Away From Debt–

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Past articles about consumer credit going down:

– In Tough Times, US consumers forging new behaviors

– Slapped by recession, can Consumer Nation rethink?

– What are investors waiting for?  Consumers.

By Eric Swanson

The below picture is a graph of the U.S. inflation rate by month from Dec 2007 to October 2009.  Notice that inflation is positive until about the beginning of 2009 and then it starts going negative.

BeatingDebt.org

–Convincing People To Stay Away From Debt–