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Slack.com slash DHQ. It's not just consumer spending that matters gang, it's how we spend.

From American public media, this is Marketplace.

In Los Angeles, I'm Kai Rizdal. It is Thursday, today, 8th December. It is always to have

you along. Everybody, we are going to go macro here at the top of the program today. Macro

about you and me and how much we owe. The Federal Reserve reports that consumer credit,

that's mainly credit cards and student loans and car loans. Consumer credit rose $27 billion

in the month of October. The annual rate of growth in consumer credit outstanding comes to 6.9%.

Again, annual rate. That is, if you've been keeping track, faster than most people's incomes

have been growing in this economy. Credit card balances alone grow and quicker than they

have in 20 years. Consumer spending is, of course, the lifeblood of this economy. I don't

know how many times we've said it, but as we borrow to do that spending, maybe that's not

so great. Marketplace's Mitchell Hartman gets us going.

Back in early 2021, at the height of the pandemic, many Americans were getting their debt under

control. Kurt Long at the National Association of Federally Insured Credit Unions explains

why. Everyone got their stimulus checks and a lot of people used that to pay down some

of their highest rate debt. So we had a big, de-leveraging. Then, the Federal money stopped

flowing. Prices started rising. And since then, consumers have been drawing down their

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