{"id":89874,"date":"2025-12-13T01:00:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-13T09:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/?p=89874"},"modified":"2025-12-19T09:16:06","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T17:16:06","slug":"black-coffee-13-dec-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/id89874-black-coffee-13-dec-2025.html","title":{"rendered":"Black Coffee: Bumps In the Road"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s time to sit back, relax and enjoy a little joe …<\/em><\/p>\n

Welcome to another rousing edition of Black Coffee, your off-beat weekly round-up of what’s been going on in the world of money and personal finance.<\/p>\n

I hope everybody had an enjoyable week. Without further ado, let’s get right to this week’s commentary …<\/p>\n

Every cloud has its silver lining, but sometimes it’s difficult to get it to the mint. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u2013 Don Marquis<\/strong><\/p>\n

Credits and Debits<\/strong><\/p>\n

Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Did you see this? Social Security (SS) was originally created to provide a relatively comfortable retirement safety net, but times have changed, as 2 in 5 people who collect that retirement benefit say they are still working<\/a>. The question is: What percentage of them are working because their SS benefits aren’t enough to cover the bills. Oh, and speaking of changing times\u2026<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Perhaps not coincidentally, Dollar Store reported this week that roughly 60% of its shoppers<\/a> earn more than $100,000. That’s up from 50% of new shoppers earlier this year in the first quarter. Another 30% of those shoppers earn between $60,000 and $100,000. More to the point, just as being a millionaire is no longer holds the same cachet it once did, the $100,000 income benchmark isn’t what it<\/strong><\/em> used to be either. The moral of the story: Your career choice matters. In more ways than one…<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Car repossessions are on track to hit three million in 2025, matching Great Recession levels and making it the third-worst year on record. Q2 alone saw 706,393<\/a> repossessions, the largest Q2 volume ever recorded. Meanwhile, auto loan delinquencies are at their highest since 2010, with subprime rates at their highest level since 1994. Frankly, that doesn’t sound like a booming economy to us \u2013 but what do we know?<\/p>\n

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h\/t: @SpillTheMemes<\/p><\/div>\n

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Credit:<\/strong><\/span> In other news, market conditions now favor homebuyers<\/a>. In fact, home sellers are outnumbering buyers nationwide by 37% \u2013 that makes it the strongest buyers’ market since 2013. Now for the punchline: Despite these conditions, prospective homebuyers are exiting the market faster than sellers. As YahooFinance<\/em> reports, “The shift underscores how small affordability gains aren\u2019t enough to unfreeze a housing market where prices are more than 50% higher than pre-pandemic levels and mortgage rates are above 6%.\u201d And, no, this<\/strong><\/em> isn’t the answer…<\/p>\n

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\nDebit:<\/strong><\/span> Since 2008, GDP has more than doubled. However, with the exception of service industries, many of which add little value, the expansion of credit is responsible for funding excess consumption and government spending. The proof is in the pudding, as US industrial production is now lower<\/a> than it was in 2008, while the debt-to-GDP ratio continues to rise.<\/p>\n

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h\/t: Jesse Colombo Substack<\/p><\/div>\n

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Credit:<\/strong><\/span> As macro analyst Alasdair Macleod observes, in the US, all “government spending is now 40% of GDP<\/a>, with 23% at the federal level. Today, the easiest way to grow GDP is for the federal government to increase its useless and economically destructive spending. At least state government spending is relevant to their communities. But federal government spending isn’t \u2013 and that’s where the trouble is mounting.\u201d Oh, sure\u2026 the politicians inhabiting Congress keep insisting they\u2019re going to reduce their spendthrift ways. The response to which can be summed up thusly:<\/p>\n