美国国家公共电台 NPR Americans' Borrowing Hits Another Record. Time To Worry?

 

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Americans' overall household debt has hit a record high, nearly $13 trillion and rising, which makes people wonder if we've already forgotten the lessons of the bubble of borrowing in the run up to the Great Recession. Here's NPR's Chris Arnold.

CHRIS ARNOLD, BYLINE¹: The last time Americans had taken on a record level of debt, we were in the throes of the financial crisis. But the economy's in much better shape now, home loans are being made to people who can actually afford them and a lot of the borrowing is arguably pretty responsible.

SASHA GALLAGHER: My husband and I recently had a baby in February. And we've had a lot of changes in the past year.

ARNOLD: Sasha Gallagher lives outside Richmond, Va. The couple just bought a house. They spent their savings² on a down payment. So they used one of those 0 percent credit card offers to buy a whole bunch of stuff for their new home - a washing machine, a refrigerator, a rideable lawnmower.

GALLAGHER: We're at roughly $6,000. And it will probably grow because at this point, we've got appliances on there but we really haven't furnished the home yet.

ARNOLD: That might sound like quite the credit card buying spree, but Gallagher says she hasn't taken leave of her senses.

GALLAGHER: You know, we're still driving both of our old beat up cars basically into the ground because a house in a good school district was more important than a new car.

ARNOLD: And Gallagher just finished pharmacy³ school and got a good job. So she's gone from being basically a starving student to being the bigger breadwinner for the family. And she says they'll be able to pay off that credit card pretty quickly. Likewise, millions of Americans have found work in recent years. And, of course, spending money keeps the U.S. economy chugging along. So maybe all this debt isn't so bad. On the other hand, some economists⁵ don't like this record borrowing. Lucia Dunn is an economist⁴ at Ohio State University.

LUCIA DUNN: The new level of debt is cause for alarm.

ARNOLD: Dunn's been studying consumer debt for more than 20 years. Her research shows that overall, only about half of credit card debt gets paid off each month. And so she says that rising credit card debt suggests that more Americans are getting stuck paying those high interest rates.

DUNN: Being in debt is a very stressful way to live. There's a lot of people who are just, you know, in a hole and so stressed out over it. We believe that group is growing.

SUNG WON SOHN: We are beginning to forget the lessons learned from the painful recession in 2007 to 2009.

ARNOLD: Sung Won Sohn is an economist at Cal State. He says he'd like to wave a cautionary flag about all this borrowing.

WON SOHN: Because consumer spending is really the largest portion of the economy and when the time comes for an economic recession, this is going to make the situation worse.

ARNOLD: In addition to all that credit card debt, Americans owe even more on student loans. Sasha Gallagher, who just bought the new house, says that pharmacy school was not cheap.

GALLAGHER: Yeah, I also have, like, a mortgage-worth of student loan payments (laughter). I'd like to not put the actual number on the radio.

ARNOLD: But it's a lot. Still, Gallagher says her degree got her that new job that's got a nice paycheck. Research shows that if you have a college or advanced degree, you're much more likely to own a house and earn a higher salary. But rising student debt is becoming a bigger drag on many Americans' finances. OK, so household debt overall is at a record high, but economist Sung Won Sohn says to keep it in perspective...

WON SOHN: I don't think this is anything like what we faced in 2007.

ARNOLD: For one thing, we don't have the systemic risk of financial collapse⁶ that we had back then when banks were making those huge bets on bad mortgages. Also, Americans' incomes have been slowly rising. So while overall debt is at a new high, it's still a lower percentage of people's incomes than it was when the financial crisis hit. Chris Arnold, NPR News.

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 savings   

n.存款，储蓄

参考例句：

• I can't afford the vacation,for it would eat up my savings.我度不起假，那样会把我的积蓄用光的。
• By this time he had used up all his savings.到这时，他的存款已全部用完。

3 pharmacy   

n.药房，药剂学，制药业，配药业，一批备用药品

参考例句：

• She works at the pharmacy.她在药房工作。
• Modern pharmacy has solved the problem of sleeplessness.现代制药学已经解决了失眠问题。

4 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

5 economists   

n.经济学家，经济专家( economist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The sudden rise in share prices has confounded economists. 股价的突然上涨使经济学家大惑不解。
• Foreign bankers and economists cautiously welcomed the minister's initiative. 外国银行家和经济学家对部长的倡议反应谨慎。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。