With a recovery like this, who needs a recession: 62 percent of Americans don’t even have $1000 in savings.

In fact, only 14% have $10,000 or more saved.  Keep in mind this amount is small in the larger picture when you consider a basic new car costs $30,000 and many minor surgeries will costs many times more than that amount.  So it is no surprise that we have a massive trend of going into debt: college debt, auto debt, mortgage debt, and credit card debt.  That doesn’t seem like a solution. 

Given the widespread information about saving money, it is more likely that Americans are simply having too many expenses given their stagnant income.  When the end of the month comes, there is nothing left over.  So saving becomes secondary to living daily life.

DYI Comments:  Folks at the lower end of the economic ladder are certainly in the throws of too little money or deficit at the end of the month.  What surprises me are folks with extra disposable income yet are unwilling to save anything.  If the next economic downturn is worse than the great recession will it be called the The Great Misery?  At these levels of savings most will be broke in less than a month when unemployed and the remainder between three to nine months.  Once credit is exhausted you have the makings of massive social unrest.  Our social safety net is not capable of handling such massive amounts of people.  Unfortunately due to deficit spending and world wide central banks we are in a bubble and when it pops the downturn will be nasty.

The Boy Scouts motto - BE PREPARED!

DYI