From the QZ article:
"Sacerdote’s paper begins by showing that, for a variety of goods, US household consumption increased despite stagnant wages."
Well, consumption can indeed increase in light of stagnant wages if debt loads are increasing too. Isn't that what we are seeing? This QZ article seems to skirt the debt issue. If people are funding consumption and an increase in quality of living on increasing debt without a commensurate rise in wages, eventually we are in for a correction and it will end in tears. Defaults will happen, creditors will get stiffed (and P2P lenders), and a retrenchment will ensue.
I am an RN at a major hospital in Southern Utah, about 1 1/2 hour away from Vegas. I've seen enough anecdotal evidence among the extremely wide variety of patients I take care of to tell me that things are not good. I live in one of the best economies in the nation, and everywhere I go I see young couples vastly overextending themselves. I remember going on a run the other day and talking with a guy who was in the process of buying a $500k house. This guy was a shuttle driver, probably making no more than $20/hr. The other "ah ha" moment I had which made me sour on the expansion was when I read Matt Levine's blurb about "puppy leasing."
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