[00:02] financial health of the US consumer because consumer spending makes up 70% And I just want to get started by just simply asking you, how are you doing financially? If you're doing like if you're doing
[00:16] well, then you are very fortunate because not everybody is. I'm going to and I'm going to be honest with you, it is unsettling data. Now, here's the A record number of Americans are taking
[00:30] 401(k)s. According to Vanguard, 6% of people enrolled in 401(k) plans made a hardship withdrawal. So, this is a record high. withdrawal. So, this is a record high. This is up from 5% a year ago. According
[00:44] to their data, here the top reasons for the hardship withdrawals. the hardship withdrawals. Avoiding foreclosure or eviction, 36%. Avoiding foreclosure or eviction, 36%. Medical expenses, 31%. Tuition, 13%.
[00:57] Medical expenses, 31%. Tuition, 13%. Home repairs, 11%. And buying a home, 5%. Now, the problem is that when people raid their retirement account money to cover expenses for today, of course, it's going to rob them of
[01:10] future. Like I understand, yeah, you need the money now, but then again, the future, right? But I mean, I get it. Life happens. Like you need the money, you need the money. Like what can you do? I understand.
[01:25] But if you took a hardship withdrawal, I know you know that that's bad, but you you really got to figure out the situation and of course, not neglect listen, I want to show you this. According to the AARP, right now, 7% of
[01:41] retirees are returning to the workplace due to financial needs. And this is a record high. This is up from 6% a year ago and at that time, 6% was a record high. 48% of returning retirees said that
[01:56] they're un-retiring because they need the money and they have a poor economic 41% said that they need to go back to work because the cost of daily living is just too high. And 11% said that their primary reason
[02:11] for un-retiring was because they're bored and they just want to stay active. Now, moving on, consumer credit card debts hit a record high of $1.28 in the US. And this is data coming from the New
[02:25] And this is data coming from the New York Federal Reserve. This is up by 5.5% compared to a year ago. Currently, about 170 million Americans have credit cards. 60% of credit card users carry a balance from month to
[02:39] And the average interest rate on a credit card is currently at 20%. Now, I want to show you the stats and this is a research report coming from the Federal Reserve and this goes up to the end of 2025, so they go by quarters.
[02:55] It was published in February of 2026. So now, I want to show you how the delinquencies are going. The credit cards are represented by that dark blue line and notice how it was at 4% in 2022.
[03:08] And now it's doubled to 8% by the end of 2025. goldish line, you know, it's not as bad as it was during the housing crash of 2008, but as you can clearly see, it's rising.
[03:23] But what catches the eye clearly is the red line. The red line is student loan And this chart goes back all the way to 2003 off the chart. And now, let's shift over to serious
[03:39] delinquency, which is 90 days or more and look at how bad student loans are. This is just crazy. More than 42 million Americans are in you from the Federal Reserve, that was going up to December 31st of 2025
[03:55] because they report quarterly. But according to the most recent data as of February, approximately 25% of student loan borrowers are now delinquents. And outstanding student loan debt has
[04:07] now exceeded $1.6 trillion. And this is and this is according to the Congressional Research Service. Going back to the Fed reports, total household debt delinquency rose to about 4.8% of all loans in the fourth quarter
[04:21] of 2025. So when you compare where we are today against the Great Recession, that may not sound or look extremely high. trend is what's important. Just 1 year earlier, the delinquency
[04:36] rate was around 3.6% and here we are today at 4.8%. And that is a big increase in a short period of time. In fact, if you take a look, the current level is the highest it's been since
[04:50] 2017. And when delinquency rates begin rising across multiple categories of debts, it often signals that households are under And that the data, I mean you take a look, it's been moving in the wrong
[05:04] direction. So when we're told that we're living in the golden age, if you take a look at the data, the data doesn't support that. You know, I'm just saying. Now, we are being told by the
[05:17] politicians that we are living in a time of low inflation, low unemployment, and of low inflation, low unemployment, and strong wage growth. don't know how you feel, but I have a healthy amount of skepticism.
[05:33] they're referring to, but I don't believe that to be accurately descriptive of our country. They're saying that the rate of inflation is 2.4%. Wages are growing at a rate of 3.8%, which means that well,
[05:48] means that we're getting richer. Now, I want you to check this out. The labor market has gotten so bad that they can't even hide it anymore. Okay, what do I mean by that?
[06:01] What I mean is that usually they'll just throw out an inaccurate number like, oh, the US labor market added 50,000 jobs in February. And then a month later, they'll quietly revise it down and they'll say something
[06:14] like, oh, the labor market actually lost jobs in February. Like that's their MO. But the situation has gotten so bad that their initial number was negative in their initial number was negative in February. 92,000 jobs lost.
[06:26] going to revise that number and it's going to probably come out to be much worse. But I want to show you this. Look at wage growth over the past 4 years. It's clearly going down. Like
[06:38] And look at the rate of unemployment over the past 4 years. It's clearly going up. That's the trend. Now, I want you to realize that an unemployment rate you to realize that an unemployment rate of 4.4% is historically extremely low.
[06:54] This is the unemployment rate for the past 80 years. And if we're this low, you know, 4.4% then from my point of view, there's nowhere to go but up. Which is a bad thing.
[07:07] So, I showed you the delinquency trend. You saw the wage growth trend. You're looking at the unemployment rate trend. And I just want to say that if we as Americans are not thriving in this environment of low unemployment at 4.4%
[07:22] and a low rate of inflation of 2.4% then I think that we're going to be in trouble a year from now. Listen, all I'm saying is that if this is the golden age, then I don't even want to think about what the non-golden age is going
[07:34] to look like. And the trend says that's where we're going. I mean, that's how I'm interpreting the data. You saw the data. You can let me know what you think. Okay, but I do want to point out a bright spot. So, it's not
[07:47] all bad news. Something that's helping temporarily is the larger tax refunds that we're seeing due to a President Trump's tax code changes in the one big beautiful bill. About half Americans have filed their
[08:00] taxes so far. The average tax refund is approximately $3,800. And that's an increase of 8.8% compared So, I'm sure that that's been very helpful to millions of Americans, but
[08:14] once that money's used up, that temporary financial lifeline is going to be used up, and it's I guess back to the financial plummeting. Okay, listen, I want to share my opinion with you. We have millions of Americans that are
[08:27] struggling, evidenced by the rising debts and delinquencies. From retirement that's at a record high, to the inability to pay student loans, to credit card debts. It is my opinion that all of this is
[08:41] happening because wages are not keeping up with inflation. But you might say, you might ask like, "Brian, like what do you mean? Inflation is at 2.4% and wages are growing at a rate of 3.8%.
[08:54] So, wages are growing faster than inflation." Listen, it's my wild assumption that the government data is unreliable, which is a nice way of putting it, a euphemism.
[09:08] Anyways, wages are not keeping up with inflation, but why is it happening? It's because of all the money printing by the Federal Reserve. Like if you're going to blame anyone, your number one suspect may be the politicians, but it's
[09:22] actually the central bankers as the, you know, the root, the source of the And the reason why I say that is because the politicians wouldn't be able to spend excessive amounts of money if the Federal Reserve refused to print the
[09:35] money for them to spend. Anyways, that's the current status, like Like it's not good. Like I showed you the data and the trend is going in the wrong direction. Like I know that this
[09:47] is not the most uplifting video, but you deserve to know the truth. That's the Thank you so much for the support. Please subscribe and I wish you a very Please subscribe and I wish you a very nice day. Take care.