CNNMoney.com struck a nerve with readers Monday. A story about savings - or lack thereof - reported that 28% of Americans have no emergency savings. So we had to ask: Where's the money?
Commenters had lots of opinions on how people spend their money and why they aren't saving.
jacalder: No money to save but somehow there's always money for beer, cigs and cell phones. It's called priorities. Too many Americans refuse to grow up.jaxbeach904: Not a cent saved, yet still have cell phones, big screen tvs, internet,
afford cigarettes and alcohol, designer clothes and shoes. Yeah, I cant
understand why they dont have any money saved!Bojak: The biggest barrier to saving is having nothing to save.
The CNN Facebook community chimed in talk about just where all their money is going. Here's a sampling of what people have said.
Home and family
Katie Fitch I am a single parent of 3 kids and get no child support, after bills, sports, braces and kids and so on what savings hahaha yeah right lol
Ron Swanson i dont feel sorry for them we raise 2 kids one autistic. I also pay my child support. We live on one income. We do just fine if we can do it anyone can. Its a matter of stop whining and just do it.
Melissa Ante I have a savings with cash in it, only a couple hundred though cause cost of living happens, can't stop it. We encourage young adults to learn responsibility, get a job and take care if themselves, but how can they when minimum wage is chump change! I have a beautiful home, average little car, bills paid, just a few dollars of extra cash to use for family outings ( taking the kids out to a movie & ice cream) but I still worry like crazy about our financial status, especially when its time to pay bills.
Taxes
Estas Cabron It's all going to taxes!
Miguel Figueroa Ha ha savings ! What a f... Joke . Come and live in Massachusetts , they tax u for everything ! Even to breathe.
Maina Santiago Save what money: between all the taxes the government takes out of my pay, the taxes I pay on EVERYTHING I buy, and the house taxes "I should save what for six months!!!" Please!
The economy
Norma Senecal Machado Are you kidding me? I'm lucky to have 6 weeks set aside for emergencies! This economic situation is killing me
Nicole Highsmith Derricott My husband was laid off 2yrs ago it has been hard, we are making a way also or should I say God always make a way for us, but it could be better/he was laid off from a job he worked at for 14yrs and they lied and said oh he still has a job to cheat him out of unemployment/we don't complain we go with the flow but I do sympathize with Eric and Mary Jo just my opinion, have a great day Ron :]
Rhonda Burns Having a rainy day fund seems to be on everyone's wish list. With the economy being what it is as of recent it has become even more difficult to create anything close to a savings plan. I try to keep a running ledger of everything I spend and when possible use only the cash on hand so I can leave a reasonable amount in my savings account. I can recall being back in 1993-1994 and having not only a retirement 401-k account with a nice nest egg tucked away but also a nice checking, savings, education and vacation accounts in place.
Bruce Myers NO kidding, were all broke as a joke....no jobs, all going overseas and we just keep giving what little money we have to huge companies like walmart, who have no sense of patriotism....they all fund other countries economies in the third world and take all our money. And were stuck in this cycle....cant afford to buy american and cant afford not too for much longer.
What savings?
AmCorbett Corbett only 28%? I personally do not know but anyoe except for two people that have emergency savings and I know way more than 100 people and I am pretty sure the percentage of people I know that have no emergency savings isprobably closer to 95%
Mike Bowman 28% seems like a low number ......
Living the good life
Los Carnales Surf House 39 single and no kids=always extra $$$ yayyyyy!
Trecee Johnstone It's not a rule of thumb. We don't have an emergency fund but we also make over 6k a month what Evers there is there. Money is meant to be spent. You can spend it foolishly or spend it wisely. We do both
We want to know where your money goes. Join the conversation on Facebook, sound off on video via CNN iReport or tell us in the comments.
Some comments edited for length or clarity.
Compiled by the CNN.com moderation staff. Some comments edited for length or clarity.
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Why don't you take your stuffy old emergency savings, and splurge on a shinny new Acura, as seen above this post.
blame bush
@Jeff hahahahaha good one!!! Looks like a nice car though.
I think there's a more general feeling of folks to live in the "right now". Since there is no guarantee of a brighter tomorrow. After all you could be run over by a bus in the A.M.!
Can anyone here tell me for a certainty where our income tax dollars go? (aka 'head tax' in Old England...why our forefathers abandoned England for America)They don't go for roads or schools or financing wars and occupations of foreign countries. Where do they go?
Do you know who much our politicians and rulers make, (that's 'make' not 'earn') and how little they add to the quality of our lives?
Mortgage, utilities, gas, groceries, dog food, and whats left after a pizza on friday goes into savings. One of these years maybe we will be able to go on vacation again.
My money goes to support a corrupt government, through taxes: Income tax, property tax, sales tax, etc.
And yes, there are two corrupt governments in North America.
The comments in the story are obviously from people with plenty of money.
15 years ago my phone bill was $75..today...$255///cable....didnt have a bill or internet.....today TV is hardly free anymore so cable/internet is $120 a month////taxes? dont even talk about how much they've gone up!!! doubled almost tripled?? ////gas...used to be $1.50....now thats doubled to around $3.25 a gal the other day////cars are almost doubled in price now/////lets make a long story short...everything has is now 2x or 3x from what it was 15 yrs ago EXCEPT the wages....they may have gone up around 20%...maybe. The 5% taking it from the 95% doesnt leave us much to save.
Why do CEOS make so much a year? with perks? and HUGE bonuses? wages that are properly due to the man on the bottom of the totem polls who actually move and help produce the stuff they sell. Why do state government employees, and politicians get such high wages, pensions and benefits? there is a fundamental problem here, between the public sector and huge corporations securing public sector employees to the unbusiness friendly politicians and local governments screwing tax payers.
That is so right. There is no CEO in this world that deserves a salary of more than $200000 including perks etc.Lets create jobs with the saved salary. They can not be so good or even god to make 10 million each year. Just remember who pays this salary. It is the share holders, the little guys like private investors etc. First i would cap the salary of these clowns and hold them responsible for any loss that they create. Jobs or financially.
I mean look how brain dead they are. If a company looses money, they will restructure. Lay of 1000s of people.
help me to understand 2 things here. a ) Why did they hire these employees in the first place and b) How can they think their company will still function after laying these employees off ? In any case, it just shows how useless they are.
Their brains did not even think about how to create new markets or how to train the employees for other tasks that could create more revenue for that company.
It is an elite club, you see these clowns jumping from one company to the next, regardless if it is even in the same flield. Today an automotive industry CEO tomorrow a toilet seat manufacturer CEO. Where is his field specific and market specific knowledge for the company he or she joins. There is simply none. It is about who you know and that is what these guys get paid for. Most of them are not even remotely qualified to perform the task at hand. They always need their life support network.
WHAT DO UNIONS,POLITICIANS,GOVERNMENT WORKERS, CORPORATE CEO's and all others near the top of the corporate chain of command have in common???? Hire then average wages? extremely huge bonuses? over the top pensions and benefits? if it's not clear why people struggle it comes from both sides of the spectrums from democrats on the left with their unions and republicans on the right with their corporations. You have taxes coming from every which angle from HUGE government, and then you have extremely high prices due to unions, and then you have stagnat wages which come from corporate greed.
I feel guilty, but I do judge people who are in a lot of debt. The only people I feel sorry for are those with medical debt. I know too many people who get a windfall and spend the money on a trip rather than on their debt, college fund, or 401k. I knew one woman who could not stop shopping.
My husband has a great job, but we don't buy an expensive car, house, or clothes. I shop at the thrift store for clothes. There is no need to buy a new car when my 12 year old car is reliable. We have Netflix and high speed internet because of his job. We don't have cable. We set our thermastat at 60 in the winter and 80 in the summer; and we are comfortable. We live in a three bedroom condo. We spend money on going out to eat, but I tell my husband that he needs to cut back. We try to enjoy all of the free events in our city. And we have money in savings and are happy. Since I am not working, I don't put my daughter in day care.
The people who I know are in debt may have a higher standard of living than I do, but we are not stressed out about our debt because we don't have it. You people who are in debt ask yourselves if you can live with less. Start making cuts now before it is no longer a choice. And don't buy a car or house that you can't afford.
I live in the Socialist Republic of California. Now you figure out where my money goes.
I'm single, no kids, rent an apt., in my mid-40s. My parents never had much $$, so I learned to be frugal from an early age (I put at least have my after-tax $$ in the bank each year). I totaled up my expenses for all of last year and determined that I could live for more than a decade without even touching my retirement accounts!
Like lemmings to the sea – we are controlled and too blind to see it. Inflation is a government tool...
Our economy is driven by a corrupt stock market, our government is driven by lobbyists and private money and corporate interests.
Divided we fall, and that's the way the government wants it.
My number one dream is to travel as much as possible and see the world. To do that, I live below my means, have a modest home with a small mortgage, skipped having kids and saved saved saved.