re: More Americans are financing groceries with buy now, pay later loans

I'd be curious to see what they are actually buying. If you go into the store and shop ingredients you can have a nice meal cheap. Tonight we had pork chops with wild rice and green beans.
Chop $4.55
Rice $1.78
Green Beans $.79

I'm pretty sure my wife didn't even finish hers.

Absolutely fricking not.

Your bringing up insulin is damning in the extreme. I get it’s a loaded question, and variants like Humalog have a justified reason to be more expensive. But not base insulin. In fact, the inventor refused to charge royalties on such a lifesaving thing. So why should the companies after him get a pass?

How many of these respondents spent the last decade racking up maxed out credit cards on stupid shite like Disney vacations, designer clothes, $100k vehicles, etc instead of scaling down debt and living under their means?

Frivolous spending to show off for social media for the last 15 years is going to bite a lot of people in the arse. Meanwhile the people who have been living below their means with minimal debt will be the ones staying out of bankruptcy courts or even more embarrassing - staying out of the payroll offices because of wage garnishments.

Remember, student loans being sent to debt collections is going to hit millions that have hit default after the payments started again last year. That's going to exasperate this financial crunch big time.

The people who have lived below their means and saved for rainy days are about to pull out their umbrellas while everyone else gets pushed into the flood water with no life vest.

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Probably because it's like going to the zoo. I went to the zoo once and was viewing the gorillas when one gorilla made eye contact with me and I thought I saw a spark of intelligence in that ape. I thought we had come to some kind of agreement. Then he rolled onto his back and started slapping his feet. He was primate again.

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spot on

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Competition and innovation aren't driving down costs. No one else willing to raise an eyebrow to this?

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The government has allowed far too many corporate mergers. There isn't enough competition because a small handful of mega corporations control every single industry.

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The government has allowed far too many corporate mergers. There isn't enough competition because a small handful of mega corporations control every single industry.

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i agree.

When was the last major antitrust breakup? Microsoft?

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I bought mine in 2022, with a fixed rate va loan at 4.25%. I got lucky before things got rough

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Brand new?

I am more concerned with the value of the materials that built the property. Materials during this time period were grossly overinflated.

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We are a long way from hurting.

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I feel like it is starting. There is a lot of talk among my friends about getting rid of services like lawn care, cleaning, and pool maintenance. A lot more fixing going on than buying new. A friend works for a children's theater company and enrollment for classes next year are way lower than they were this time last year. Summer camps are not filling up as fast. Pool memberships for the summer are down (both private and country club).

This year is the first in a long time that the bulk of my friends stayed home during spring break. None of the European tours, cruises, Disney, beach resort trips we normally see. It was a topic of dinner with friends last week, they saw it in their extended network too.

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How's daddy basement treating you?

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It has a 2.75% interest rate because I have an 800+ credit score