Who are the Debt Poor?

Steven Pressman and Robert H. Scott

Journal of Economic Issues, 2009, vol. 43, issue 2, pages 423-432

Abstract: Our previous research argued that interest payments on consumer debt should be subtracted from household income to measure poverty. We estimated 4 million additional poor Americans in 2007, calling them "debt poor." This paper finds that the debt poor are somewhat like the poor (they are unlikely to own a home or have private health insurance), somewhat like middle-class households (race), and in-between in other ways (education levels). Debt poor households were likely middle class once, having access to considerable consumer credit; but following a loss of income, their large debt burden put their living standard below their poverty threshold.

Keywords: Debt poor; Survey of Consumer Finances; consumer debt; poverty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009

Downloads: (external link)
http://mesharpe.metapress.com/link.asp?target=contribution&id=C5881K23298Q085R (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mes:jeciss:v:43:y:2009:i:2:p:423-432

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Economic Issues from Inderscience Enterprises Ltd
Series data maintained by Christopher F. Baum ().