Most Americans Hanging on By a Financial Thread: Study : HousingWire
Want a stunning figure? Half of Americans now say they are only one month or less away from not being able to meet their financial obligations if they were to lose their job — just two paychecks or less. And of these, more than half — 28 percent of all Americans — say they could not survive financially for more than two weeks without their current job.
This disturbing data comes courtesy of the 2009 MetLife Study of the American Dream, released Monday, which looks at how the financial crisis has affected the American Dream and consumer perceptions. It’s all the more disturbing considering that unemployment in the U.S. has already surged to 8.1 percent, with 651,000 jobs lost last month alone.
A Bloomberg News survey of economists released Tuesday morning found that economists now expect unemployment levels in the U.S. to reach 9.4 percent this year alone, and remain elevated through at least 2011 — prospects that paint a potentially grim picture for the U.S. economy in general, and for housing in particular. Traditionally, borrower defaults are driven by macro-economic factors such as increased rates of unemployment.
Brian Vellmure's Blog 