From payslip to panic: Half the country is on the brink, and the system is keeping us there |
Half of us are just one bad month away from financial ruin.
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Lots of stats are used to describe financial exclusion, but that one, calculated by Fair4All Finance, sticks with me for its power to explain the way Britain feels like it does.
Sure, there are numbers for how many of us do without bank accounts or have scant credit files, but nothing comes close to realising every second person you meet is a single missed paycheck or an unexpected bill away from serious debt.
The rising cost of housing, energy and groceries has pushed record numbers of us into relying on credit to afford the basics.
We’re not borrowing to get ahead any more. We’re borrowing just to stand still.
A broken boiler. School uniforms. A car repair so you can still get to work. These are not luxuries. They are the ordinary costs of an ordinary life, now increasingly financed on terms that leave........