60% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck, expert explains

JACKSON, Tenn. — Practice makes perfect, even with financials.

April 24 through April 28 is Financial Practice Week. It’s focused on perfecting our spending and saving habits and reducing our debt.

Overall it’s an effort to take the strain off of our piggybanks.

According to the federal reserve, Americans now owe $683 billion on their credit cards, that’s an increase of $61 billion from 2021 to 2022.

60% of Americans say they’re living paycheck to paycheck, and 44% of Americans say they don’t have $400 to cover an emergency.

And with interest rates on the rise, along with the cost of food, housing, and utilities, our piggybanks may be near the breaking point.

“Yeah, raising interest rates and inflation and all of these things have just an enormous impact on the way consumers are looking at managing their debt. And one of the greatest things we can do is a little bit of self reflection, and be able to really integrate what it is we’re doing on the technical side of our personal financial planning practices with what is going on on the inside,” said personal finance expert Dr. Erika Rasure. “Yeah, so one of the ways we can start getting in the practice of of saving is to really look at it as you know, taking baby steps. We want people to really get to that point where they can look at savings as not an overwhelming action. That’s something I see a lot with my clients at beyond finance, they are often just so overwhelmed by debt, that the idea of saving becomes almost astronomically not possible.”

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