Summary
Gen Z is increasingly relying on “buy now, pay later” (BNPL) services for holiday shopping, with spending projected to rise 11.4% this year, totaling $18.5 billion.
These services appeal to younger consumers with limited credit histories but can lead to overextension, as they lack centralized reporting and encourage overspending.
Experts warn of accumulating fees, particularly when BNPL plans are tied to credit cards.
With inflation and rising credit card debt already burdening Gen Z, consumer advocates caution that these services may worsen financial instability despite their convenience.
Systemic issues can only be solved with systemic changes…
No amount of shaming individuals will fix systemic debt issues, if this is such a large trend that it effects most of the generation then it can only be fixed with systemic changes.
The narrative that individuals are responsible for widespread debt is propaganda meant to shift blame off of the rich people causing wealth inequality to skyrocket
There is propaganda and then there is fact that nobody teaches their children about budgeting and financial responsibility. Do not treat credit like money you own, do not allow yourself to perceive luxury items as something you need, be mindful of what you can actually afford. Today people seem to have problems with these ideas - lack of education on the topic and aggressive ad campaigns by corporations resulted in that.
But while we cannot change masses, we not only can, but we should point this out to as many people as we can. Often all you need to notice something is for someone else to ask question about why that happens. And yeah, sure, maybe helping one or two people won’t make a dent, and even then these people may already be past saving or simply unable to pick up new habits. But if every mindful person tries to help someone else at least once, shift in society is guaranteed. And such shift will result, maybe, in actual change.
And, on a more flat approach - being aware of your own budgeting limits, spending power and how much money you use is not actually yours tends to radicalize people against the rich.
Only systemic changes can fix systemic issues .
This widespread propaganda needs to be countered with grassroots encouragement of more practical relationships with money though. That’s the cultural onus for systematic change. Don’t just shame them, but encourage everyone to live more responsibly and to vote for people who will reign in the creditors spreading this propaganda and loaning easy money to every financially irresponsible person
Without grassroots cultural change anyone who reigns this shit in will face political suicide for taking away their easy lines of credit. We see similar things with things like carbon taxation and other incentives to reduce carbon emissions that involve reducing overconsumption by all people (because yes, the average American is part of the problem too). The elites need to lose the most, but all of us need to live a financially and environmentally sustainable lifestyle and the systemic changes we all talk about wanting will impact our lives.
Only systemic changes will fix systemic issues
Oh wonderful and I suppose we should do nothing to bring those systemic changes about too? No systemic changes begin with changes to our community mindsets. The big creditors want you to not be talking about how they’re propagandizing to convince you to take easy lines of casual credit for fun little splurges and that that’s a trap and you shouldn’t take it. They want you to think that it’s not worth saving money and living within your means and they want you to keep up with the joneses and to make your friends uncomfortable not doing so. And most importantly they want people to feel like any expectation that they shouldn’t get instant and constant gratification is an unacceptable cost. When they get their way systemic change is infeasible. When they are seen as parasites lying to the masses and tricking them into living beyond their means, systemic change becomes possible. Politics are downstream of culture. You can’t change the policy neatly as easily as you can change the minds of those around you
Pretending like individual choices would do anything ignores the fact that these systemic issues can only be fixed with systemic changes
No amount of financial literacy will fix income inequality, we need to redistribute wealth if we want everyone to have the proportional wealth to participate in the economy.