What is Digg?89 Comments
- poidh, on 01/30/2009, -2/+47I had a good year in 2008 (up until the end of the third quarter anyway) and I was going to reward myself with a used Porsche 911 and a boat. My income since then though is down about 60%, so I've decided to hang on to my money because I don't know for how long the ***** times will last. Add the fact that people are still trying to sell used Porshe 911s and boats at March 2008 prices. ***** that. I want to buy at January 2010 prices. We keep hearing that the economy is absolutely ***** sideways (which it is as far as I can see, because I'm on the front lines), so when people want to start selling at ***** sideways prices then I'll start buying. I know people who feel the same way too.
Please note that this post is in no way a boast about being able to afford a sports car and a boat.
Please note also that the only reason I want to buy a sports car is that I have a small penis and I heard somewhere that buying a sports cars makes hot chicks magically not notice that your penis is small. The boat is just so I can piss PETA off by riding out to sea to catch and eat sea kittens. Tasty, tasty sea kittens. - ltethe, on 01/30/2009, -0/+23Student loans? I'm assuming that's part of the equation. If you got a house... Then the average is more?
My best guesses. - Feep, on 01/30/2009, -4/+24Hold the hell on. Those on Mint.com (presumably, a reasonable sampling of the entire country) have an average debt of over FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS?
What the hell is wrong with people? Are negative numbers too complicated? - UselessTrivia, on 01/30/2009, -0/+18Also I doubt Mint.com users are a representative sample of the population. They've already indicated a desire to track spending and budget leanly just by using the service. They're probably more money-conscious than average consumers.
- panicoffice, on 01/31/2009, -0/+17You've got to be joking me!!!
Let's take the average user of that data. He/she has a monthly *spending* budget of ~$4K (chart 1) that means their household income before taxes somewhere around $80K per year. Which would put them somewhere around the (top) 75th percentile of the US population interms of income according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_t ...
So the comsumers in the top quarter income bracket "are spending $400 less each month than they were a year ago, have burned through half of their savings, and on average have taken on an additional $5k in debt."
That's REALLY scary, because you can only imagine how everybody below them is doing.
HOLY F@CKING $HIT! - krellor, on 01/30/2009, -1/+17Yeah, if only banks had boxes, that they would hold for you for safely holding deposits you didn't want in your account or non-money items. I think I would call them safety deposit boxes. I think I'll patent that. /s
Seriously, mattress? Warehouse? Paranoid much. Besides, they aren't loaning out your money in the sense you are thinking of. - BotchaMcCoola, on 01/30/2009, -2/+12Keep your cash out of the bank too. If they really need money to lend make them prove it by paying decent interest rates on savings.
- chinaman1472, on 01/30/2009, -0/+10Ever bought a new car? Realize most people do car payments and no pay up in cash.
Houses aren't exactly cheap and people don't pay hundreds of thousands of dollar upfront.
Student loans? This can be anywhere from (easily) $20,000 to $100,000 or even more depending on what kind of school and degree you're getting, even more when you aren't a state resident. - jaybol, on 01/31/2009, -0/+9dugg for eating sea kittens
- Barackalypse, on 01/31/2009, -1/+9"Since the crisis first hit in September, our user registration rate has more than quadrupled, giving us 900,000 sample points on the economy."
They should have limited their analysis to accounts that were open during the entire time period they were studying. The best indicator of decreased spending are accounts that are spending less than they used to, but as soon as you throw a whole bunch of new accounts into the data you lose the ability to say people are spending less, because it could simply be that all your new users spend less than your old ones did. - yocouchdigga, on 01/31/2009, -0/+8funniest comment I've read all week, you sir are a champion amongst diggers.
I award you my internet of the week.
Now tell me, what are you doing to secure your money/protect your savings from inflation? I'm at a loss and our situations are similar... I'm sure my penis is much smaller, I was looking at a ferrari. - inactive, on 01/31/2009, -0/+7I still enjoy "furry fish", real kittens, but prepared like fish. You'll say "meow" once you try it.
- Hillsfar, on 01/31/2009, -1/+8There are people like me who joined for a while and quickly realized a few things about Mint.com
1. Our main checking account where money is deposited and money is spent is not with Mint.com, so Mint doesn't have a complete picture of my finances.
2. I buy things with my credit card and Mint considers it expenses. I pay my credit card bill, and Mint considers it an additional expense. See a problem here?
3. Mint mis-categorizes so many transactions and I'm so tired of re-categorizing each transaction that I stopped.
So Mint.com thinks, I'm spending money and not bringing in much income, my expenses are sky high, and I'm buying a lot of financial services. And it gathers all this data from me and from everyone else and starts extrapolating.
Data can be a good thing, and there definitely are some trends that push through the noise. But please do take Mint.com's results with a grain of salt. Garbage in, garbage out. - dianebl, on 01/31/2009, -0/+7all reading your comments showed me was that you are an idiot who enjoys insulting people. Well done.
- woofers07, on 01/31/2009, -0/+7What advantages does this car have over.... say a locomotive? Which I can also afford.
- dpchi, on 01/31/2009, -0/+6I agree that 50k in credit card debt is a little insane, I have well over 50k in debt due to "owning" a home.
- poidh, on 01/31/2009, -0/+6Well you *might* do, but a lot of people are relying on credit to fund themselves. Almost no one will admit to using credit to buy that big *****-off TV or that big *****-off car but they do. And lenders aren't lending like they were. And because the credit isn't there, a ***** load of people are losing their jobs because credit isn't available for purchases, which means that a small but significant proportion of the population aren't in a position to buy anything more than groceries and rent.
So although it might look like things aren't too bad, there are lots of people who have been removed almost entirely from the economy. But like you said, there are also a lot of people who have removed themselves due to fear. Put it all together and it isn't a pretty picture. - rtcrooks, on 01/30/2009, -0/+6Those numbers make me feel better about myself.
- Hillsfar, on 01/31/2009, -0/+5So their sample is self-selecting to a certain extent and biased towards people:
1. With Internet connections
2. With Bank accounts and credit cards
3. Into managing their money better - redgiemental, on 01/31/2009, -0/+5Look there has to be some function of removing user that are deemed as offensive. It is only temporary until they look at what you've been saying.
Same happens on most reputable websites. In fairness you have been saying some pretty stupid *****. - zephc, on 01/31/2009, -0/+5Gutsy person. You're a shark. Sharks are winners, and they don't look back because they have no necks. Necks are for sheep.
- lsatkins, on 01/31/2009, -0/+5I would like to see this over multiple years and not just 2008. For all we know this is a common trend for spending over the course of a year.
- berational, on 01/31/2009, -0/+5In the sentence before the graph it mentions "Loans" includes (mortgage, HELOC, student loans, and personal loans)
with mortgage in there the number is really small for my area (San Diego) where the median house price is around $400,000.
a $50,000 HELOC alone would be about average.
Still the trends are likely consitent - Fustigations, on 01/31/2009, -0/+4If some reader tags you for being offensive, you blame it on the staff? Now you're trying to drum up help(?) from those same readers that reported you? Sounds to me like you've got a failure in your logic module.
- Ryanw430, on 01/30/2009, -3/+7Things aren't really that bad. Sure, nominal spending is down, but then again, you have to consider the following: cars are cheap, computers are cheap, gas is cheap, stocks are cheap, new homes are cheap (if you want to upgrade), and interest rates are cheap. Even if you've taken a pay cut during the recession, you're probably making more than you were unless your pay was slashed by more than 40%; granted, many people are outright out of work today, and many people have seen pay cuts of 60% or more (myself included), but the biggest problem we have right now is irrational fear more than anything. If you cooperate with your family and friends a little bit and get rid of the things you don't need you'll not only survive this recession, but you'll come out far ahead in the long-run.
- jaybol, on 01/31/2009, -0/+4Although, they certainly might also be people who have made some mistakes and are paying attention for the first time. But you bring up an interesting point, that the data is representative to some extent of people who care about their finances and are trying to improve and monitor where their money goes, and are ultimately going to (in some cases at least) spend less than people who don't use the site.
- poidh, on 01/31/2009, -0/+4It looks really good, goes really fast, corners like your locomotive on rails and makes the chicks love me*.
*My perceived bank balance/ earning potential/ potential for the them to shop on my dime. - ScienceDoc, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3I am not sure they really showed anything that was not already known. In addition, their sample is biased.
- mishabear, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3why not? our government has put us trillions of dollars into debt. if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me!
- oldgal, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3Thanks for posting useful information.
- Ryanw430, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3Yeah, but then again--they are printing TRILLIONS--not billions--but TRILLIONS. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to hold onto cash or bonds at the moment; yet, that is what these banks/corporations are doing. The banks will start loaning cash by the truckload once they realize its becoming worthless. And then we'll see another fanatical market bubble before the next crash--and I think the next crash will be THE crash. This is more of a little seismic shock that people will quickly forget before the eruption.
- poidh, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3I was originally looking at a Ferrari F355, but they are too expensive I think. The only cheap ones were Toyota MR2s made to look like F355s. If I wanted an MR2 then I'd invent a time machine so that I could go back to 1995 and buy one.
About protecting banked money from inflation. Well firstly, as long as I can hang on to at least the bulk of my money then I'll consider myself lucky. There are lots of people at the moment who don't have two threpenny bits to rub together. If I can come out of this realatively unscathed then I won't be happy but I will be content.
Although inflation is dropping, my bank (and almost all banks as far as I can see) will not pay a decent interest rate at the moment, so there are only two ways I have been able to see to potentially keep my money from losing value. One is to invest in my business in the hope that once things bounce back (eventually), I'll be in a better position to take advantage, so I'm having more websites built plus some custom coding ***** to automate processes and I have found that some tech guys are willing to work for a lot less than they were this time last year. That's good, because last year they all wanted £400 per hour which is completely unrealistic; I'm not paying that even in good times. The other is to agressively seek out people who really need to sell their houses. I've just gone in with my parents to buy a three bedroom house which at the height of the boom was worth about £120k. It was on the market for £75k but we've picked it up for £55k with my stake being £20k. We'll rent it out until times are better, then flog it. We're looking for similar opportunities. Cash is king at the moment; we are going to do 100% cash buys until we are forced to mortgage the properties we had before the economy went bad (which have now lost value), in order to keep on buying should there continue to be good deals around. My Porsche and my boat will just have to wait though, so I've got another two or three years of having a tiny ***** :( It's costing me a fortune in tweezers. Perhaps by then, gene therapy will take care of my shortcoming and I won't need the Porsche after all. Still gonna buy the boat though. Those sea kittens look too tasty to pass up. - inactive, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3the low income group is probably just plodding along like they always have. Now that the economy sucks they might actually be able to afford stuff.
- pOwErEdByNOS, on 01/31/2009, -0/+3You're a douche and nobody wants to listen to your rants. Simple.
- Taiyoryu, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2So based on the chart 1) people aren't beautifying/personalizing their home, 2) traveling less, and 3) eating (out) less but not by much. Makes sense. Most every other type of spending stayed relatively flat except for a few noteworthy spikes/dips. Shopping and donations spiked during the holiday season. That's no surprise. Apparently a lot of people skipped paying for utilities in November. I was expecting that to be flat. Either that, or the month was unseasonably warm. But the big surprise for me was the rise and sudden spending drop for financial advice. It would appear many people may have fired their financial adviser during the summer, perhaps after seeing their investments start tanking. Or perhaps, being post tax season, finances are on the mind of everyone and that's when people take it upon themselves to get their finances in order. The former interpretation is more entertaining.
- Ryanw430, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2I'm in Vegas too; trust me, I hear you. It's amazing to me how people without a college degree complain about making $15 an hour in times like this.
- pilotkid, on 02/02/2009, -0/+2All I know is the lines at the local Starbuck's are still out the door every morning....
- berational, on 02/03/2009, -0/+2I'm not complaining. I think San Diego is the best city in the world for me. Just saying the numbers don't seem like a good sample.
- oldgal, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2I also think piss-poor executive management in our Financial Systems is contributing not only to the panic, but to the reality. These guys did not believe that real estate prices would ever take a dip? That is so profoundly stupid, that if it is true our over-paid execs are truly dangerous, if it is not true then our over-paid execs are seriously unethical if not criminal. Having retired from banking (systems), I am not sure which I believe...probably a bit of both.
- inactive, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2i'm not talking about PHYSICAL printing. Every loan is 'printing'. Federal Reserve banks run the country, we'll own it soon. As soon as everyone forecloses. We're the top of the financial food-chain. Biggest scam in town ;-)
- comrade693, on 02/01/2009, -0/+2I don't have these problem (although I don't have a credit card so I cannot comment on that).
There were some issues at first on categorization, but you can tell mint to remember how you categorize a purchase and it will. It's like the new location bar in Firefox 3. At first it gets some results that you don't want, but over time it gets better. - oldgal, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2Since when is it necessary to print money? I thought all you had to do was work for an investment bank and create account entries.
- yocouchdigga, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2so... buy houses and stock in a tweezer manufacturing company, thanks for the advice.
- panicoffice, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2So you're one of those "recession IS the cure" folks :)
I'm curious to know why you think that. What are your thoughts on the philosophy of "who gives a ***** what your "debt" is. Just keep working, keep making stuff, keep buying more stuff. That's the only way the standard of living will improve."
Because essentially those are the two ideologies we have to decide between right about now. I'm leaning towards your reasoning myself actually, but I'm not sure I'm totally convinced yet. Help me out here. - linagee, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2I just spent $500 on a dozen or so new tools from eBay. (Hoping to break even soon on the investment.) But that's the only spending I've done so far besides food/utilities/roof over head/paying off debts spending in the past year. (As in 12 months, not 30 or so days.)
- jfreeman, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2You can partly blame government for trying to keep prices elevated. Some people think that recessions should never occur - even in the face of unsustainable booms.
- BotchaMcCoola, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2Actually my guess is that the banks can get or borrow money just about free from the Fed or Treasury. Then lend it out at attractive rates. Why bother paying us savers a fair interest rate in that case? Keep all the profit themselves.
- crazycracker911, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2It's called inflation...
- jfreeman, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2The economy we have, with artificially manipulated interest rates driving a consumer society (instead of a productive society) encourages this behavior. People are only rationally responding to economic incentives. Our central bankers discourage savings.
- inactive, on 01/31/2009, -0/+2For the federal reserve, 100 dollars is only 7 circular pen scribles away from 1 billion. if you can't fight the federal reserve, join it. I say join it.
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