this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2025
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Even households earning $150,000 a year are struggling with credit card and car payments (www.cbsnews.com)
submitted 3 days ago by return2ozma@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world
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[–] JollyG@lemmy.world 44 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

According to this article delinquency rates on car and credit card loans more than doubled for households earning 150k+ from 2023 to (presumably)2024! The delinquency rate MORE THAN DOUBLED!

. . . From somewhere around 0.17% to 0.34% of all loans in this class

So, no households earning more than 150k are not struggling.

Reporting relative percent increases for extremely small values is a journalism sin.

[–] dhork@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Note that it is still a small proportion of higher-income earners who are underwater, it's just just a higher percentage than before:

the delinquency rate for households earning at least $150,000 now stands at about 0.34%, versus 1.75% for low-income households.

So it's not like the rich are suffering, it might be certain people in certain high cost of living places who overextended themselves .....

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 19 points 3 days ago (1 children)

$150k a year income is far from rich. I'm not arguing that they aren't better off that a household earning $50k but it's not all lollipops and roses like you're assuming. Tax wise, these people get hit the hardest because they're earning enough to pay high tax rates but far from enough to hire fancy accountants or structure their money in a way to pay lower rates.

This doesn't even account for CoL where some places like the bay would classify $150k as "low income."

[–] iopq@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

My dad makes this much, in the SF bay area this only allowed us a middle class lifestyle. It's just so expensive to live here

[–] phutatorius@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Incompetent financial management can afflict people regardless of how high their income is.

[–] slaneesh_is_right@lemmy.org 2 points 2 days ago

I knew a guy who had a pretty impressive company that he build up with a friend. I couldn't tell you how much money they made, but he would always buy $100k+ dollar cars and then sell them for half the price a month later for various reasons. He's now 10 years later rather poor.

[–] BombOmOm@lemmy.world 8 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (3 children)

Lifestyle inflation.

People are really, really good at spending all their money, then living paycheck to paycheck with their BMW and too-many-sqft house payment.

[–] mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de 14 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Nah, it's just regular inflation and companies not paying anyone what they deserve. Even people making 200k aren't getting paid what they deserve, which sounds insane to most people, but it's true. 150k doesn't even buy you what used to be a medium quality of life in the 90s, and especially not any earlier than that. Reminder that 200k household income does not put someone in the 1%, it puts them more in the top 15-10%. It's the top 1% that can be accused of lifestyle inflation, everyone else is just trying to reclaim a decent quality of life in exchange for their lifetime of soul-crushing labor. 150k sounds like a ton: It really isn't. Even 200k sounds like a ton: it really isn't.

[–] Death_Equity@lemmy.world 8 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Do you know a lot of people making $150-200k a year?

I do. 3,500sqft+ home, $80-100k truck(too many with a pristine bed) and luxury SUV or 2x luxury SUV on lease, often a boat or camper, some with vacation property, most with maid service, lots of door dash and rideshare, 2-3 kids, 1-2 foreign vacations a year(usually Mexico with a Europe trip every 5 years), etc.

Income creep is a huge financial problem. If they lived like they made half that, they would be so much better off. They like to live their lives keeping up with the Joneses on Insta and it is dumb as fuck.

[–] mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de 11 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

I do know a lot of people making over 150k, three of them live in 800 square foot apartments (not luxury apartments), one of them splits a 2200 sqft house with four other people, one couple lives in a mediocre 1900 sqft house with one 12 year old car and 1 new car. None of them have any children, all of them go on 1-2 foreign vacations a year. None of them own cars over 40k MSRP. All of them wish they could save more for retirement, all of them are afraid of medical costs in old age. None of them are posting their glamour on Instagram and none of them care much about social media in the first place.

All these people are certainly living better than my friends who make less money, I won't deny that! But my point is that they're not rich and it's pretty upsetting that just because most people are super super super underpaid they get resentful towards people who are merely underpaid and attribute their financial struggles to irresponsibility. It's the same icky narrative that the actual wealthy people have pushed for decades to get people to look down upon poor people. You're right, my 150k+ income friends could live with greater financial comfort if they changed their lifestyle to match my 50k income friends, but it wouldn't be enough extra that they could retire before 60 anyways, it wouldn't be enough extra that they could not have to worry about medical bills when they're older, it wouldn't be enough to let them afford the houses they actually want, or fix things around the house when they break, etc etc etc. So that's why people "irresponsibly" go on vacations or buy themselves nice things, discretional spending coming out to probably 10-20k per year. That isn't enough to make a bigger better difference in their lives if put somewhere else.

I just don't like to see condescension and judgement directed at the financial habits of anyone making under, like, 400k. Of course, there are people at ALL income levels who spend their money on stupid junk, I know plenty of people like that too. But most people are not like that, and the narrative that they are is a harmful one that turns the bottom 99% on each other.

P.S: Yes, I live somewhere with a fairly high cost of living. But as I mentioned in another comment, this doesn't disqualify the relevance of what I'm saying, because most people making over 150k are living in a HCOL area.

[–] phutatorius@lemmy.zip 0 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I just don’t like to see condescension and judgement directed at the financial habits of anyone making under, like, 400k.

It's not condescending to consider what works and doesn't work when your means are constrained.

Unless they're paying child support or making a deliberate lifestyle choice, there's no compelling reason for someone earning $150k-plus to be house-sharing.

[–] thedruid@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

You're judging people without knowing their plight

When I made a 160k a year now where it went! Medical bills, rent and food

Now fuck off of with the judgemental shit

[–] thedruid@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago

No you don't lol.

[–] onslaught545@lemmy.zip 5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

That's highly dependent on your location.

[–] mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de 5 points 3 days ago

Yeah, that's a true and good point. But at the same time, I bet most households making over 150k are households in locations where it's not a lot (That's why their salaries are what they are). Like, out of the households making 150-300k, how many of them are in NYC and the Bay Area alone? Probably a shockingly large percentage.

[–] thedruid@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days ago

There are places on CT alone where 150k is barely middle class. And moving isn't an option because it's either too expensive or it would take the person out of commuting distance.

Then the layoffs hit and people spend their money paying for the too high cost of living in ct, with little job prospects.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Nah, it's survivorship bias.

The wealthiest people are wealthy because they always took big risks that kept paying off.

So someone who desires that, never puts safe money away, they never save.

Every penny is invested, every purchase goes on a credit. Because why pay now when you can invest that money for free another 2 weeks?

As long as "numbers always go up" it works...

But then the market crashes, and everything is still tied up. You don't have funds to pay the bills, and if you sell to pay the bills, you're realizing market loss.

So it's "lifestyle change" but not always wanting better stuff

The wealthy literally have a different lifestyle than the "paycheck to paycheck" the majority of people have. We can both have our shit completely fucked overnight thru no fault of our own

For most of us, that's just reality. For the wealthy it's a choice.

[–] phutatorius@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

The wealthiest people are wealthy because they always took big risks that kept paying off.

Like taking the risk of having rich parents...

We can both have our shit completely fucked overnight thru no fault of our own

Regardless of how much you're investing, you need to take risk into account and diversify to mitigate it. The people I know who got into trouble when the market tanked had a risk appetite that exceeded their means. High-risk, high-reward investments are a bad choice when your financial stability is put at risk when they don't pay off. Don't gamble what you can't afford to lose.

[–] iopq@lemmy.world 0 points 2 days ago

Nothing really crashed, my stocks are doing well. I also had no problem selling stuff at a loss. This is just being irresponsible

[–] tal@lemmy.today 6 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Even households earning $150,000 a year

Nicholas Cage made a lot more than that and still got himself into trouble:

https://www.businessinsider.com/rich-famous-celebrities-who-lost-all-their-money-2018-5#nicolas-cage-was-one-of-hollywoods-biggest-stars-earning-40-million-in-2009-alone-but-also-one-of-itsbiggest-spenders-2

Cage purchased many homes, automobiles, and rare artifacts. However, in 2015, reports started to emerge about how he blew his $150 million fortune from 1996 to 2011.

The IRS placed tax liens on multiple properties he owned and then had Cage hand over more than $6 million for failing to pay his 2007 tax bill. Cage's precarious financial situation led him to sell many of his personal belongings, including a treasured comic book.

As of May 2017, Cage is worth a reported $25 million.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_Cage#Real_estate_and_tax_problems

Cage was once considered one of Hollywood's highest-paid actors, earning $40 million in 2009 according to Forbes, although he failed to make Forbes' Top 10 List in 2014.[195][196] In 2004 he bought a property on Paradise Island, Bahamas. In May 2006, he bought a 40-acre (16 ha) island in the Exuma archipelago, some 85 miles (137 km) southeast of Nassau and close to a similar island owned by Faith Hill and Tim McGraw.[197] He bought the medieval castle Schloss Neidstein in the Oberpfalz region in Germany in 2006 and sold it in 2009 for $2.5 million. His grandmother was German, living in Cochem an der Mosel.[198]

In August 2007, Cage purchased "Grey Craig", a 24,000-square-foot (2,200 m2) brick-and-stone country manor in Middletown, Rhode Island. With an estate occupying 26 acres (11 ha), the home has 12 bedrooms and 10 full bathrooms and overlooks the Atlantic Ocean. It borders the Norman Bird Sanctuary to the west. The sale ranked among the state of Rhode Island's most expensive residential purchases.[199][200] Also in 2007, Cage purchased Midford Castle in Somerset, England.[201][202] Shortly after selling his German castle, Cage also put his homes in Rhode Island, Louisiana, Nevada, and California, as well as a $7-million island in the Bahamas, on the market.[203]

On July 14, 2009, the Internal Revenue Service filed documents in New Orleans in connection with a federal tax lien against property owned by Cage in Louisiana, concerning unpaid federal taxes. The IRS alleged that Cage failed to pay over $6.2 million in federal income tax for the year 2007.[204] In addition, the Internal Revenue Service had another lien for more than $350,000 in unpaid taxes dating from 2002 to 2004.[205] Cage filed a $20-million lawsuit on October 16, 2009, against his business manager, Samuel J. Levin, alleging negligence and fraud.[206] The lawsuit stated that Levin "had failed to pay taxes when they were due and had placed [Cage] in speculative and risky real estate investments 'resulting in (the actor) suffering catastrophic losses.'"[206] Cage also faced separate lawsuits from East West Bank[207] and Red Curb Investments for unpaid, multi-million dollar loans.

Samuel Levin filed a counter-complaint and responded to the lawsuit in a filing stating that he warned Cage that he was living beyond his means and urged him to spend less. Levin's filing states that "instead of listening to Levin, cross-defendant Cage (Coppola) spent most of his free time shopping for high ticket purchases, and wound up with 15 personal residences." Levin's complaint continued: "Likewise, Levin advised Coppola against buying a Gulfstream jet, against buying and owning a flotilla of yachts, against buying and owning a squadron of Rolls Royces, against buying millions of dollars in jewelry and art."[208]

In his filing, Levin said that in 2007, Cage's "shopping spree entailed the purchase of three additional residences at a total cost of more than $33 million; the purchase of 22 automobiles (including 9 Rolls Royces), 12 purchases of expensive jewelry, and 47 purchases of artwork and exotic items."[208] One of those items was a dinosaur skull of a Tarbosaurus. After discovering that it was stolen, he returned it to the Mongolian authorities.[209]

According to Cage, he owned the "Most Haunted House in America", a home located in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana.[210] Known as "The LaLaurie House" after its former owner Delphine LaLaurie, the house was foreclosed and sold at auction on November 12, 2009, along with another New Orleans property for a total of $5.5 million, in the wake of Cage's financial problems.[211] His Bel Air home, which had six loans totaling $18 million on it, failed to sell at an April 2010 foreclosure auction despite an opening offer of $10.4 million, substantially less than the $35 million that Cage had originally tried to sell it for. The home, built in 1940 for $110,000 (equivalent to about $1.9 million in 2023), had been owned at different times by Dean Martin and singer Tom Jones.[195]

The home eventually sold in November 2010 for $10.5 million.[212] Another home in Nevada also faced foreclosure auction.[211] In November 2011, Cage sold his Action Comics #1 in an online auction managed by Heritage Auctions for a record-breaking $2.16 million (the previous record being $1.5 million), to assist paying his tax liens and other debts. Cage purchased the comic in 1997 for $110,000.[213] The comic had been stolen from him in 2000, and Cage had received an insurance payment on the item. In March 2011, it was found in a storage locker in the San Fernando Valley and was verified by ComicConnect.com to be the copy sold to Cage previously.[214] Worth around $25 million by May 2017, Cage was reportedly "taking [film] roles left and right" in order to pay off his remaining debts.[215] By 2022, Cage confirmed that he had finally paid off his debts and intended to be more selective with his film roles.[216]