The debt burden of U.S. households is the smallest it’s been in nearly 16 years. Household debt — including mortgages, credit cards, auto loans, student loans and other credit — grew for the 16th consecutive quarter in the three months ending in June, rising by 0.6 percent to $13.29 trillion, the New York Fed reported yesterday. But that's only half the equation.
On the other side, personal disposable incomes reached an annual rate of $15.46 trillion in the quarter. That means the debt-to-income ratio dipped to 86 percent. That’s the lowest, by a very small amount, that this figure has been since the fourth quarter of 2002.
But it's a long way down from where this number peaked. At the height of the credit bubble in 2008, household debts topped out at 116 percent of disposable income.
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