I’m worried “paycheck to paycheck” is up to the interpretation of the person filing it the survey and how the questions are phrased. Depending on how the questions are worded, they’d possibly include me. My wife and I max our IRAs, 401ks, and HSAs each year. Anything that can be put on the credit card, is (then paid off before any interest can accrue). Like sure if you look at our monthly expenses vs income hitting the bank, we are “paycheck to paycheck”. But we could both lose a significant portion of our income and be just fine (provided we scale back retirement savings).
Unless they address that in these articles or surveys, it just sounds like they’re trying to get the poor and middle class to just agree to this shared misery while the rich keep fucking the world over.
Speaking anecdotally, I’ve always heard “living paycheck-to-paycheck” to mean having insufficient savings to cover a missed paycheck
I.e. if you don’t get an expected paycheck then you cannot pay your monthly debts/utilities/rent and still have enough money to feed.yourself and your dependents
Which is why I’m worried it’s not adequately defined. I’m definitely not paycheck to paycheck. But they could word the questions in such a way that I’d be included.
Oh, absolutely. If you click through to the Quicken press release they have a small section defining their methodology but don’t list the specific questions
I wish more people appreciated the lengths that Pew et al. go through to both minimize and recognize sources of bias, confusion, etc
I’m not sure that they asked that directly. It looks like they asked if people are using their credit cards to cover bills more, and whether they expect to be able to fully pay the credit card bill off by the end of the year.
This is like all those surveys saying that 70% of Americans have less than $5000 in a “savings account.”
No shit, yields on savings accounts have been pointless for about two decades. Everyone with spare money puts liquid savings into index funds in margin accounts and runs on credit cards.
I’m worried “paycheck to paycheck” is up to the interpretation of the person filing it the survey and how the questions are phrased. Depending on how the questions are worded, they’d possibly include me. My wife and I max our IRAs, 401ks, and HSAs each year. Anything that can be put on the credit card, is (then paid off before any interest can accrue). Like sure if you look at our monthly expenses vs income hitting the bank, we are “paycheck to paycheck”. But we could both lose a significant portion of our income and be just fine (provided we scale back retirement savings).
Unless they address that in these articles or surveys, it just sounds like they’re trying to get the poor and middle class to just agree to this shared misery while the rich keep fucking the world over.
Speaking anecdotally, I’ve always heard “living paycheck-to-paycheck” to mean having insufficient savings to cover a missed paycheck
I.e. if you don’t get an expected paycheck then you cannot pay your monthly debts/utilities/rent and still have enough money to feed.yourself and your dependents
Which is why I’m worried it’s not adequately defined. I’m definitely not paycheck to paycheck. But they could word the questions in such a way that I’d be included.
Oh, absolutely. If you click through to the Quicken press release they have a small section defining their methodology but don’t list the specific questions
I wish more people appreciated the lengths that Pew et al. go through to both minimize and recognize sources of bias, confusion, etc
“We asked a group of gambling addicts if they run out of money regularily” /s
I think that’s the point though. It’s subjective.
Many people think the phrase applies to them because paycheck to paycheck is their budget cycle. They’re not living hand to mouth.
I’m not sure that they asked that directly. It looks like they asked if people are using their credit cards to cover bills more, and whether they expect to be able to fully pay the credit card bill off by the end of the year.
This is like all those surveys saying that 70% of Americans have less than $5000 in a “savings account.”
No shit, yields on savings accounts have been pointless for about two decades. Everyone with spare money puts liquid savings into index funds in margin accounts and runs on credit cards.