"The Plastic Safety Net," released Oct. 12 by policy research and advocacy groups Demos, the Center for Responsible Lending, and the AARP, reveals what's on our credit cards, why it's there, and what we're doing to manage our financial obligations.
The study found that most debt-strapped households use credit to cover unavoidable expenditures, not discretionary purchases. We're increasingly relying on plastic loans to pay our rents, mortgages, utilities, groceries, car repairs, and insurance premiums.
Washington, DC — American families are turning to credit cards to make ends meet in an increasingly volatile economy, according to The Plastic Safety Net: The Reality Behind Credit Card Debt in America, a new report released today by Demos and Center for Responsible Lending.
DEMOS, a New York-based public policy group that studies economic opportunity issues, and the Center for Responsible Lending, a Washington policy group focused on predatory lending, said low- and middle-income families fall into credit card debt to cope with income declines or unexpected costs.
According to the survey, 48 percent of respondents said they used credit cards to pay for car repairs while 38 percent reported paying for home repairs with plastic.
Washington, DC — On Wednesday, October 12, 2005 at the National Press Club in Washington DC, leading policy research and advocacy groups Demos, the Center for Responsible Lending and AARP will release findings from a new national survey of household debt in a report entitled The Plastic Safety Net: the Reality of Household Debt in America.
Eighteen- to 24-year-olds have an average $2,985 in credit card debt, according to last year's Demos USA study, "Generation Broke." The average plastic debt for 25- to 34-year-olds is $4,088.
New York, NY/Washington, DC — Today, Reps. John Conyers (D-MI) and John Lewis (D-GA), and 28 other leading members of Congress have called on the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to take immediate action to enforce Section 7 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA). Section 7 requires that public assistance agencies, such as family assistance, Medicaid and disability services offices, offer applicants and clients the opportunity to register to vote.
Steve Carbo, of the Democracy Project, a New York-based advocacy group that pushed for broader voter registration, said Iowa did far better than many states in implementing the provision.
Voter registration among the disabled and elderly in Iowa increased eight-fold between the 2000 and 2004 elections, Secretary of State Chet Culver said Wednesday.
Des Moines, Iowa — Today, national voting rights groups ACORN, Demos, and Project Vote released a report highlighting Iowa's "best practices" for offering voter registration in human services agencies offices, as required by the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA). The new study, A Promise Unfulfilled: Ten Years Later, finds most states noncompliant with this NVRA requirement, known as "Section 7", more than a decade after it was passed into law.
People ages 45 to 59 are the most likely to refinance, according to Demos, a nonprofit public-policy organization in New York City.
The real estate bubble will eventually burst, says Cary Silvers, vice president of New York City--based GfK NOP, a market-research company that in 2004 gathered information on boomers' attitudes toward refinancing.
Javier Silva of Demos, a New York-based think tank, yesterday opposed any change. Raising the limit would extend a dangerous trend of loosening lending standards to enable consumers to buy homes they can't truly afford, Silva said. "The answer is to find ways to lower home prices, not simply raise debt limits to allow inflated prices to soar even higher," he said.
A proposal to reduce housing costs by relaxing federal lending limits in pricey real estate markets drew a mixture of praise and sharp criticism yesterday from real estate analysts.
Demos's senior research associate and author of A House of Cards: Refinancing the American Dream, Javier Silva, said that, even in the absence of a real estate crash, many families "are facing a financial crisis," partially because they've taken on more mortgage debt.
As more and more people have rushed to be homeowners, they actually own less of their homes than they have in decades...adding another risk factor to the overheated real estate market.
The study revealed some startling results that suggest a college education has become unaffordable to many young adults. For example, more students are taking on debt to finance their college education because of a shift in federal student aid programs. In 1980, the most common form of college funding was federal grants, which amounted to 52 percent of the government's student aid system. Loans followed at 45 percent. But by 2000, loans had risen to 58 percent of the student aid pie while grants dropped to 41 percent.
New York, NY — As the National Governor's Association convenes today in Des Moines, Iowa, the Right to Vote Campaign applauds Governors Vilsack, Warner, Guinn, Riley, and others who took action to restore voting rights for thousands of people with felony convictions.
New York, NY — As the National Association of Secretaries of State convenes today in St. Paul, Minnesota, the Right to Vote Campaign applauds Secretaries Pedro A. Cortes of Pennsylvania, Rebecca Vigil-Giron of New Mexico, and Cathy Cox of Georgia in their efforts to streamline the process for restoring voting rights to thousands of people with felony convictions by making registration information more easily accessible.
New York, NY — Today, Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack, joined by a bipartisan group of legislators, issued an executive order that restores voter eligibility to thousands of disfranchised Iowans. Previously, Iowa was among only a handful of states that permanently denies the right to vote to people with felony convictions. Felon disfranchisement has been criticized across the country for unfairly excluding citizens from the electoral process and for its discriminatory impact on minority communities, who are disproportionately represented in the U.S. prison population.
According to Demos, a New York-based research group, young Americans have the second-highest rate of bankruptcy - topped only by 35- to 44-year-olds. Demos says financial troubles often start when students leave college with credit card debt and student loans that already are unwieldy. According to Nellie Mae, graduates are leaving college with $20,500 in student loans and almost $2,864 in credit card debt.
Whether you want your child to get a credit card or not, he or she will probably get one. About 76 percent of students have them.
As Javier Silva, senior research associate at Demos, a research and advocacy group, explained: "Prices have gone up so high that a lot of people can't afford to get into the market - so lenders have responded with these products," he said, stressing the popular loan world euphemism.
New York, N.Y. — Today, a coalition of New York State voting rights and civics organizations announced a press conference for Thursday, June 2, to urge a legislative conference committee in Albany to reject dangerous measures that would restrict voter access to the polls. All mayoral candidates have been invited to speak in support of New York City voters. Thus far, Gifford Miller has confirmed his attendance.
The debate on voter ID is a clash between some people, many of them conservatives, who believe more restrictions are needed on voting and registration to rein in fraud, and others who think the process needs to be opened up to more voters, according to Miles Rapoport, who as secretary of state for Connecticut from 1995 to 1999 oversaw that state's election process.
Long lines, challenged ballots and two of the closest presidential elections in the country's history have touched off a landslide of propo
Over the past decade, credit card debt among 18-24 year olds rose by 104 percent according to a report released by the nonprofit research organization Demos entitled "Generation Broke: The Growth of Debt Among Young Americans."
Although over a third of young adults own credit cards, young people receive little in the way of financial education.