It Will Take 93 Years For People to Get Out of Debt

The Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) in the UK is saying that based on their recent clients, it will take an average of 93 years for people to get out of debt. The CAB model is unlike anything available in the U.S.

Citizens Advice works to provide fee advice to consumers and is supported by funds from the UK government.

Citizens Advice said the average person who came to it for advice owed £16,971, two-thirds more than the average debt accumulated by its clients in 2001.

David Harker, chief executive of Citizens Advice, said: “These findings make sobering reading, especially as they are based on data collected just before the worst of the credit crunch began to bite.

“Low income, combined with irresponsible lending, unreasonable debt collection practices and badly informed financial decisions are at the root of many of our clients’ debt problems.

“For many there is little prospect of their income increasing or their circumstances changing. The reality is that they are condemned to a lifetime of poverty overshadowed by an inescapable burden of unpayable debt.”

The United Kingdom is moving far ahead of the United States in providing tangible advice and assistance to people with low incomes who have no other place to turn for help. In addition to the CAB, the UK has also recently implemented a new cheaper form of insolvency called the debt relief order. Under a debt relief order a credit counseling group can help to make a consumer bankrupt without having to go to court.

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  • Justin

    “two-thirds more than the average debt accumulated by its clients in 2001.”
    I know there is something going on in the world other than a bunch of people not being able to budget their money. It seems like the perfect storm in financials with public debt. During the Bush years the price of fuel skyrocketed, causing the cost of food, merchandise shipping costs, everything to go up and become very difficult to afford. The increased price of insurance, Healthcare mainly, but also after hurricanes in the south, home insurance went up drastically. We the people have had little choice but to put basic needs on the credit card. Sure, if we hadn’t made that extra purchase we may have been ok, but in the 70′s and 80′s that extra purchase wouldn’t have sent us into bankruptcy. Today’s climate is a different story, and it seems to be disintegrating the middle class, leaving only the rich and poor to run the world, and which of those two classes makes the rules? Once we lose the middle class, it’s doubtful that mankind will move forward in civility, research, anything with meaning with no motivation to pursue anything. If your born rich, what’s the motivation to create? If your born poor with no chance of getting ahead, what’s the motivation? Things need to change, and I’ve heard that tagline before, but nothing is changing, the corporations run the world and we’re all screwed…..
    Merry Christmas :)

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