Upper middle class NEED Payday Loans??

[serryjw]

WHY???
quote......
The store, which opened last year, sits at 5005 S. Kipling Parkway in Littleton, near the busy intersection of Kipling and West Belleview Avenue. It's in a suburban shopping center, next to a dealer of high-priced artwork and two doors from a yoga center.

And it is surrounded by households with median annual incomes of $71,295, about 50 percent above the state median

Thirteen are in communities where the annual household median income surpasses $70,000, according to a Denver Post analysis of state and U.S. census data. Ten of the 13 have opened in the past two years.

Seventeen percent of the industry's customers have annual household incomes of more than $50,000, and 20 percent have at least a bachelor's degree, according to a 2004 study commissioned by Community Financial Services Association of America, a payday-loan industry trade group.

Last year, Check Into Cash opened a store in a southeast Aurora neighborhood with an annual household median income of $95,347.

Nationwide, the company has placed stores in neighborhoods with income levels as high as $100,000, Covert said


end quote.......

http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_3060138

[Inland]

1. Absotutely. Pawn shops, too.

Can find both in solidly middle class areas.

[NYC]

8. Which means we need to redefine middle class.

If people can't afford themselves, something is wrong.

[AlienGirl]

18. Ding ding ding! You hit the target precisely!

The "middle class" is not what it used to be. Middle-class Americans used to be able to afford to buy a house (and be able to pay it off in their lifetime), pay for their own or their kids' college education, and be able to count on retiring with a pension--and that was with one income. Back then, top executives of corporations also weren't paid 400 times what their workers earned--there was a slightly more even wealth/income distribution in this country.

Now, the relative cost of everything is higher, there is little job security and not much chance of advancing within a company, and corporations don't provide a lot of the services they used to (like pensions). The "middle class" has been slipping into extinction, leaving behind an America made mostly of people just barely getting by (and often not even that) with a sprinkling here and there of the uber-wealthy, just like other third-world countries.

Tucker

[Inland]

24. In my defintion, middle class includes

people without significant liquidity. I don't see a huge problem with a payday loan here or pawn there. I don't think that means an unaffordable lifestyle, just one that is afforded with a relatively high interest, short term loan.

Let's just say that payday borrowing and pawning, if done repeatedly, is a sign that SOMETHING is wrong. It's really expensive money. The fact that I see those establishments in a county with one of the LOWEST poverty rates in the nation is a bad indicator.

[BlueJac]

2. The USA needs a payday loan.......WTF

[serryjw]

4. If you make that kind of money .....

why don't you use your credit cards?? Probably MAXED out! That is one sad commentary on the state of Americans finances

[DBoon]

3. I bet its for the hired help

gardeners, housekeepers, and other low paid service jobs.

[MADem]

7. Unlikely, they can find one in their own neighborhoods, sadly nt

[mondo joe]

27. With a median household income of 71k I don't think you'll see a lot of

hired help.

[Botany]

5. the bush economic miracle rolls on.

I was talking to a customer tonight and said I want to wake
up and find out it is just one bad dream.

Christ that asshole is killing this country. He has to go.

[MADem]

6. Now that is FUCKED up, pardon my french

I live on a pension, quite comfortably, and I make it a point to not buy it if I cannot pay for it. I have exercised fiscal discipline for years, and have an emergency fund put by as well. Sure, things can happen that can cause a person to go into debt (major illness, a family tragedy, the kid getting put in jail and needing a lawyer) but for the most part, that is NOT THE NORM.

Putting these payday loan joints in high end neighborhoods suggests that plenty of folks are living well beyond their means--too far, in fact. Amazing, this consumer society...everyone needs the latest toys, the fanciest cars, the jazziest clothes and shoes, just to "compete."

I refuse to play--I like my beat up old clothes and sneaks. I like my old car. And the best thing is, I don't look rich, so who wants to rob me???

[NYC]

10. Do you have to pay for health insurance premiums?

They are exorbitant, and could have a serious impact on someone's ability to pay bills.

[serryjw]

11. Chances are if you make $75K++

you probably have company paid health care....nice try, thanks for playing

[NYC]

14. That's true.

Having paid my own for so long, I had forgotten.

[txindy]

26. You'd think so, wouldn't you? Sadly, though, not necessarily.

I know plenty of people who have token healthcare via their company and they make well over $75K. Needless to say, healthcare is a major, major expense for them.

[Squatch]

35. I make over $80,000 and my company does not

pay for my healthcare. That comes out of my pocket in the form of a $300 monthly premium.

[MADem]

17. Not yet.....

Uncle Sam takes care of most of it.

Under BUSHCO, though, that could change.

[NYC]

20. Let's hope he doesn't get to make that change.

I find myself in the position of envying people on Medicare, even though that means I would have to be older. (I'm wishing I could be old just to stop paying health insurance premiums. What a world.)

[bobbieinok]

22. medicare costs...$78/mon to medicare, ca $200 for medigap

medicare goes up ca $10 in 2006

prescription drug card ca $35/mon......to help pay for prescriptions....if you don't think you need it now but then decide later you need it (a medical problem requiring expensive drugs, etc) you will pay a penalty for not signing up when you could have

medigap payments depend upon which plan you opt for and which state you live in


FIND OUT YOUR OPTIONS IN MEDICARE BEFORE YOU MUST SIGN UP

if you are 65 and not working you MUST sign up for Medicare, even if you're still eligible for Cobra (I had about 16 months of a very good plan left)

[NYC]

23. By the time I get to sign up for Medicare,

there won't be any Medicare.

However, if by some miracle, Bush & Co. are stopped, I will indeed check all the options before I make a decision.

[donheld]

9. serryjw i'm as surprised as you are.

I see those places all over the inner part of denver and never much venture out to the suburbs. I guess it's because they're all in debt up to their eyeballs out there in the burbs. Next time i watch people walking in and out of those places i won't be so quick to judge.

[sendero]

12. Yet another symptom...

... of what is really crippling America - which is not terrorists but good old debt.

It doesn't matter if you make $20K or $100K, if you spend more than you make you are in a precarious position.

Americans, for the most part, are living like tomorrow will never come. It's going to suck when it does.

[MiniMandaRuth]

13. heh .....

just wait until their credit card payments double...

suburbanites tend to vote repub and they do get what they vote for.

[AlienGirl]

15. Most "middle class" people live paycheck-to-paycheck

The true "middle class" has pretty much disappeared in this country; even in relatively high income brackets most people are living paycheck-to-paycheck, paying off a staggering amount of debt (usually student loans, often medical/dental debt), and generally just scraping by.

Tucker

[serryjw]

19. I have no doubt that Bushit is killing this country with his policies

but part of this has to be living to high. How many in UPPER middle class areas are driving (2) $50K ++ cars. I'm sorry, no ones needs to live in a $500K house ( on a variable interest rate or 40 year fixed)and they are in Denver.

[Walt Starr]

16. With good reason

Those income levels are notoriously over extended on credit. As such, they are perfect prey for the usury of PayDay Loan sharks.

[Ilsa]

21. And "Dollar Stores" and "Family Dollar Stores". nt

[jmowreader]

28. The right kind of dollar store does well in a high-income area

There are dollar stores in Pinehurst, NC.

Pinehurst is basically a gated community with a zip code. Poor people can't afford to live there. But dollar stores thrive.

The reason is product selection. These dollar stores sell lots and lots of little decorative crap and little of the survival stuff your normal dollar store has. If someone wants to build a Christmas Village in their home, and doing so is popular in Pinehurst (they want to make their own little Biltmore House replicas), they can go to Carolina Pottery in Smithfield, spend $300 and come away with thirty little ceramic houses and some fake snow...or they can go to a dollar store, spend the same $300 and come away with enough ceramic houses and fake snow to fill the living room.

Dollar stores in rich neighborhoods are there because rich people like lots of cheap crap too.

[CitrusLib]

31. And as my mother always said, 'money does not buy taste'.

;-)

[Ilsa]

39. Well, that's pretty cool. But most of the stuff in our dollar stores

is cheap knockoffs. Even some of the soap suds are duds.

[jmowreader]

40. And the ones in Fayetteville too

[mondo joe]

25. Income is only 1/2 the picture. Expenses are the other 1/2.

Americans habitually live beyond their means.

If the median income is $71k but the median expenses are greater, you'll have people living on the edge.

[KansDem]

29. Perhaps "payday loan" is a bit too harsh...

"Investor-class dividend-anticipation certificate" is a more polite term...

[SmokingJacket]

30. Canary in the Coal Mine.

Or, to use a different animal metaphor; sharks can smell blood in the water from a mile off, you know.

[mccoyn]

32. Lower middle class CAN'T afford Payday Loans.

The terms on those things are terrible. They don't help anyone who can plan from paycheck to paycheck. The upper middle class can afford to not care about such mundane thing (what do you think comfortable living means?) The lower middle class and lower class will go bankrupt if they don't keep close track of their money.

The biggest luxery I enjoy is not worrying about money.

[ComerPerro]

33. Debt. Obligations

Some people who make 70,000 a year life in half-a-million dollar homes.

[lildreamer316]

34. Credit cards mortgage loans car payments

will do that to you. No suprise here.

[NorthernSpy]

36. usury is out of control nowadays, though some of us resist it...

... as much as we can.

For example, I refuse to have a credit card, and when my parents built their house, they saved up for it for decades (literally) rather than get stuck with a mortgage. Being free of that kind of major debt was worth living in a trailer for all those years.

But a lot of people in our society -- not only the poor -- are at a terrible disadvantage in these matters, because they've been led to believe that borrowing money is normal. They just don't realize how harmful owing money can be to their prospects for security in life. They assume without question that this is how things are supposed to be done.

And the corporate world exploits that naivete for every last penny they can get. Consequently, debt is destroying people's lives.


We need better anti-usury laws.

[triguy46]

38. Usury is seen as a growth industry in Oklahoma

the pay day loan sharks just got preferential protections from the OK legislature last year, insuring their ongoing ability to suck the poor fools even more.

[triguy46]

37. Classic problem of this group....

All cash flow, no wealth. This is discussed in depth in "The Millionaire Next Door," by Thomas Stanley. Though these people have large incomes, through bad decisions and lack of money management, they never accumulate "wealth", those things that have cash value. So the money they make goes to debt payments, inflated mortgages for trophy homes and second mortgages for other toys. It does not take much out of the ordinary for them to discover they do not have cash when they need it: simple things like deductibles and copays for out of the ordinary medical expenses.

Simply put, people in this country make 2 mistakes: they live beyond their means, and they buy too much "stuff".

[Kaylee]

41. Let's get realistic here....

They are saying a household median income of $71,000. That is not alot of money in some of these major metropolitan areas. For example I live in the DC metro area. We are a little above this income and to be frank have to budget like crazy to make it each month. We have two kids and both of us work full time. One income doesn't make it nowadays.

First major expenditure - TAXES. That $71,000 annual income is gross not net. It hurts to look at my paystub each month.

Second major expenditure - HEALTHCARE. My company charges $550 per month for healthcare for us. That does not include the copay and deductibles for small kids that seem to be at the doctor at least once per month for some reason or another.

Third major expenditure - MORTGAGE. A lot of this is up to your choosing, but when you have kids you want to live in one of the better school districts. I did not want a mortgage and to have to pay for private school for 18 years. The better your school the more expensive houses. We are not talking McMansions here, but 40 year old single family homes that when we brought were $350,000. They have now gone up to $600,000. The housing market in DC is ridiculous, but renting a 3 bedroom apartment would be just as expensive without the tax write off.

Fourth expenditure - What do you do with the kiddies before they are old enough to go to school (which will now be an additional year off due to the changing of the cutoff age for kindergarten). DAYCARE. Even the filthiest, non-certified establishment would charge you over $500 per kid - Infants are at least $900. You would like to not worry about the safety of your kids while at work so you fork over the $700 for the 3 year old and $1100 for the 10 month old.

EVERYTHING ELSE - Gas that now cost double what it used to, the last year of car payment on the family car (husband drives a beat up Corolla that is at least paid off), diapers, formula, school field trips, car registration, that baby shower gift for Paula in accounting, the flat tire you got last night.....

LIFE SUCKS and money's short and it is not all because of mismanagement and frivilous spending on the part of the middle class. The price of everything has gone up. Because you want to give your kids a fighting chance to a least become middle class citizens who are well rounded and had a fun childhood, you pay a little extra for the daycare center that has hot lunches, a reading resouce teacher, and certified providers; you buy the house with the school where parents fight for the few volunteer slots and the kids are encouraged to excel; you do the dance classes and use gas traveling to playdates; you are contributing to the 529 plan for your kid's education (which also went up significantly between kids) and putting money in an IRA for retirement since working 30 years at a job doesn't guarantee you a living pension.

And as much as I complain to myself, I also say at least I have a choice to max myself out financially to provide what I consider the "best" for my kids. At least I can see a light at the end of the tunnel, when my kids will be older and finances will stabilize. If the middle class is struggling, look at those who make less. In DC, making $30,000 for a family of four means you are not letting your kids play outside, their school more than likely does not have the learning materials necessary for success, teachers are more than likely are not pushing the kids towards higher education, and your kids are not in extra-curricular activites that will keep them off the streets and out of trouble (exceptions noted), you have not saved for college and woe on you once you retire.

[GreenPartyVoter]

42. My parents together made about that kind of money, but they

had HUGE debts so were struggling as much as we are at times.