

Meet the Average American Family (Infographic) - cwan
http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2010/04/meet_the_averag.html

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jazzychad
I love how when you click the image, it takes you to a _smaller_ version!

Here is a link to a much bigger and more readable version:
[http://c1334262.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/average-
am...](http://c1334262.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/average-american-
family.jpg)

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brg
I believe this is a content-free presentation. It seems obvious that many of
the facts presented are meaningless or are not provided in a proper context.

"$117,951 average debt" includes home mortgage. The poster states 95k of this
is in mortgage and 2.2k in credit cards, but not where the other 20k is
located.

"25% of people have no savings", while over 25% of the population is children.

"40% of working Americans are not saving for retirement", taking into account
that working Americans include those between 18 and 35, I would say that is in
line with expectation. We are not told if this counts those with pension funds
payments from their employer.

"24% workers who have postponed their retirement age in the past year," which
population is this a sample of? Are they only counting those whose retirement
is imminent?

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jfarmer
I agree the "average debt" is a silly, but I assumed "25% have no savings at
all" (note: it does not say "25% of people") meant "25% of working Americans,"
a continuation of the line item right above it.

~~~
brg
You may be correct, the lack of conjunction and my reading left to right, top
to bottom conspired to introduce ambiguity in my interpretation.

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listic
Just for your information, this might not bear much meaning to people outside
USA.

I'm a Russian guy and it is mostly gibberish to me. No saving for retirement?
No mutual funds, stock or bonds? Is it supposed to be striking or what?

Also: less than 4/10 of American adults have an emergency fund to fall back
on. This is still pretty big fraction of prudent people if you ask me, isn't
it?

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Tichy
What happens to Russians who retire?

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listic
They get pension, which is funded from the taxes they presumably paid while
they were working (if they were not working, they will still get some). Just
like it is in other countries, I suppose.

~~~
Tichy
And nobody ever considers to save any money on the side? Or which parts of the
"infographic" were confusing to you?

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listic
I guess some do consider; don't know how many. But if you say that 40% don't
save for retirement I just have no idea if it is supposed to be unusual or
perfectly normal. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised with any number up to
80%; I suspect most people are reckless and not forward-thinking (judging by
myself maybe - I am reckless young man) And - is it supposed to be some
special kind of saving scheme that you use for retirement?

The same goes for mutual funds, stock, bonds and. Are all people supposed to
have them? Or bank accounts, even. Sure, most people have them now, but some
don't. 7% or 16% looks ok to me.

I wanted to communicate that I (and probably many other people) have no frame
of reference to relate the information in this infographic to, while the it
implies that anyone does. Well, maybe this is not a good infographic after
all.

~~~
Tichy
Not saying it is a good infographic, but I suppose it also provides it's own
frame of reference. If it states that 40% don't save for retirement, it almost
implies that for at least 40%, it is not a normal thing to do. Of course it is
open how may don't do it because they don't care, and how many because they
can't afford to.

One weird aspect: where I live, buying a house would count as "saving for
retirement". Not sure how they counted it in that infographic.

As for being reckless: just wait, thinking about retirement might become more
prevalent for you the older you get...

Incidentally I think this is why many young people accept bad salaries: they
have no idea yet how much money real life really costs.

As for (private) saving for retirement: where I live every now and then there
are big campaigns for it. But it also is big business, so it is questionable
how much of that campaigning is for the benefit for the people, and how much
is for the benefits of the banks. Ie is owning stocks and bonds and stuff good
for you, or for the banks and funds?

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acangiano
Good, now let's meet the Median American Family.

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cloudkj
Hear hear. Also, these statistics are nowhere near the average income tax
statistics I saw when I finished my tax returns on Turbo Tax this year. The
average income is much, much higher as are some of the other categories
(capital gains, etc). I guess there's a big difference between the tax-filing
average American family and the overall average?

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blueben
Is Turbo Tax's data from all Americans, or just their customer base?

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jacquesm
Does the household debt include the debt to the bank on the house?

I can't stand infographics btw.

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electromagnetic
From what I gathered it does, which whilst is technically a debt it shouldn't
be classified nearly the same as an outstanding balance on a credit card.

That's like treating a fresh steak the same as a can of corned beef. Yes it's
beef, but one will last a few hours sat on the counter and the other will last
god only knows how long (I've yet to see a can with a best before date).

In general a mortgage is a pro, it's going to cost you but in the long run
you've got a good chance of breaking even or even profiting. I know my parents
bought their house for 75,000GBP and sold it for 250,000GBP in the space of 15
years, because of their mortgage agreement they were paying low rates for the
longest of times.

Right now is the ideal time for mortgages when the banks are offering lower
rates, but the house values have little choice but to go up from now, giving
you a major boost to your equity at the reevaluation and possibly giving you a
rate drop due to the added collateral with no effort.

Edit: It's worth noting that a $1000 mortgage is a shitload better than $1000
in rent.

~~~
brg
_Edit: It's worth noting that a $1000 mortgage is a shitload better than $1000
in rent._

Not necessarily, as there is a marginal utility involved with owning a home
versus renting that this statement does not account for. For instance in a
rental there is no lawn maintenance required, no responsibility for repairs or
upgrades to either major appliances nor infrastructure, rental incurs
decreased liability, and the availability by location and public features is
often greater.

I am a home-owner, but the belief that rental payments are a waste of capitol
is a myth.

~~~
smallblacksun
Also, the renter doesn't pay property taxes (directly, anyway), while the
homeowner does.

~~~
jacquesm
That depends on the country.

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sophacles
Wow. This is kinda... woah. I recently began an overhaul of my financial
situation, because I thought I could be doing better. I am way better off then
the best possible combination from this sheet -- I can't imagine being in that
situation. :-/

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mbrubeck
The average American has one breast and one testicle.

~~~
earl
Actually, 0.97 testicle, 1.0 breast.

<http://www.indexmundi.com/united_states/sex_ratio.html>

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mattmaroon
Very cool but not as informative as it might appear in some ways. From what I
can gather (by Googling a bit to find the stats he's using) he seems to be
using a mix of means and medians and they're coming from different sources and
different years. This isn't the best idea, but might be unavoidable.

Despite being the most prosperous nation in history, that chart would make us
look destitute. Using different forms of averages hides an extremely
significant factor: our income gap.

While good by world standards, it's poor-to-mediocre by developed nation
standards and getting worse. I'd argue it's the biggest threat to our long-
term stability because it compounds all of the others, but I suppose that's
getting off-topic.

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maukdaddy
Original source: [http://www.visualeconomics.com/the-american-familys-
financia...](http://www.visualeconomics.com/the-american-familys-financial-
turmoil_2010-04-29/)

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nrao123
Small detail but neverthless annoying while comparing a stock & a flow. "2
Trillion of Debt is more than GDP of England"

Its like I am saying I am worth more than 1 year of your income.

More here: [http://rodrik.typepad.com/dani_rodriks_weblog/2007/11/is-
mar...](http://rodrik.typepad.com/dani_rodriks_weblog/2007/11/is-martin-
wolf-.html)

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tome
They seem to think the United Kingdom is called "England".

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whakojacko
If you look at the GDPs, it seems that they area actually talking about
England-Google tells me $2.67T for UK, $2.13T for England alone. Its more like
they seem to think that England's flag is the UK's flag-But honestly, most
Americans probably wouldnt be able to tell you what England's flag looks like
anyways (they would say the UK flag)

~~~
petercooper
_But honestly, most Americans probably wouldnt be able to tell you what
England's flag looks like anyways (they would say the UK flag)_

I suspect most English people would struggle with it too if it wasn't hijacked
by xenophobes and soccer nuts.

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madmaze
that is down right sad, how does a country like the US end up like that? i
would love to see stats like this for europe or places like china

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mbrubeck
China famously (among economists) has the highest national savings rate in the
world - about 40-50% of GDP, compared to 10-15% for the US, 20% for Europe,
and 25% for Japan. China has very different cultural expectations related to
saving and spending.

On the other hand, the US spends a higher percentage of GDP on education than
most countries, which is a different form of investment in the future.

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teye
Not a very attractive infographic. For relief, see <http://feltron.com>.

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spython
True. An infographic is bad, if the information it contains is more easily
perceived in text form. Which is the case here.

~~~
wyclif
Incorrect use of apostrophe as well.

