Also, middle class people are saving tons of money on everything from daycare to restaurants. I frequent personalfinancecanada and have spoken to a few co-workers about this.
Plenty had 3000 a month daycare bills. Not anymore. Plenty spent 1500 a month on restaurants. Not anymore. In Canada at least, we got to the point where 30% of income was being saved.
> The savings rate in the second quarter of 2020 surged to 28.2 per cent, up from 3.6 per cent before the COVID-19 pandemic struck. [0]
At least in the US - the increase in savings rate is tightly correlated with the stimulus payments. I'm pretty sure you got a lot of stimulus in Canada, too.
>90% of adults don't have kids in daycare.
Even if you assume that all toddlers 1-5 go to day care and all of them have two parents (over 18) and no parents have two toddlers, the max is ~12% of the population. In reality, it's probably closer to ~7%.
> I'm pretty sure you got a lot of stimulus in Canada, too.
Stimulus programs in Canada have been targeted towards loss of income, whether on the individual side through a job-loss cash benefit or on the business side through a wage subsidy program.
To my knowledge, no large jurisdiction in Canada has given out cash payments equivalent to the US stimulus money, so a family that has not suffered job loss (partial or full) will not have gained gross income.
Not just the middle class. My lodgers used to spend 1 evening a month moving balances from one interest free credit card to another. The pandemic has meant they've paid their debt off. They suddenly asked about ISAs (British tax free savings accounts) and buying things for the house.
No booze, no eating out, fewer drugs, no entertainment events, no holidays, it cuts across economic groups.
At least over hear inflation has remained negligible. It must be a nightmare if you've lost your job (not been furloughed, just dumped) and I think plenty of people on zero hour contracts or similar are in that position. Still, things are at least starting to reopen.
I wish we had US style bankruptcy laws here. Plenty of brit will spend a decade or more having their lives ruined by the last 18months.
Plenty had 3000 a month daycare bills. Not anymore. Plenty spent 1500 a month on restaurants. Not anymore. In Canada at least, we got to the point where 30% of income was being saved.
> The savings rate in the second quarter of 2020 surged to 28.2 per cent, up from 3.6 per cent before the COVID-19 pandemic struck. [0]
[0] https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/household-savings-in-...