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Well lets see.
Average personal debt is right around 20k (mortgage not included).
Average yearly salary in the US is also right near 20k.
This now pulled from US department of Commerce.
Average savings percentages in the US since 12-04 to current.
December 2004 4.4%
January 2005 0.9%
February 2005 0.6%
March 2005 0.5%
April 2005 0.2%
May 2005 0.4%
June 2005 0.0%
Looks like nearly 100% of average peoples incomes are going to rent/mortgage, utilities, groceries, debt, or whatnot. Thus I still will go with my previous answer of 10-25% of any given paycheck at any given time, accounting for check floating and the like. Though technically it appears that many accounts are in a negative in reality if a paycheck was late, they got injured or had a large expense.
Edit- couple quotes I found.
More than 40% of all women had less than $500 in the bank. For those 25 to 34 years old, the percentage without a rainy day fund jumped to 55%.
"a large proportion" of Americans are not saving and have never saved, Salisbury acknowledges. "That's largely a function of income . . . They're just barely managing to survive as it is, and they don't have enough income to save."
More than 70% said they worried about their finances in the last year, and two-thirds said that unexpected expenses -- things like the furnace breaking or the car needing to be fixed -- were the cause of that worry
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