St. Louis Fed: New Consumer Debt Report

ST. LOUIS – The Center for Household Financial Stability at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis has released a new report—The Quarterly Debt Monitor: Trends in Consumer Debts in St. Louis, Little Rock, Louisville, Memphis - and Beyond. The report was launched through the Center’s publication In the Balance and takes a comparative dive into debt locally and nationally.

“District borrowers had a very different experience than the rest of the country,” the publication states. “The District had a more gradual deleveraging period and a smaller share of borrowers who fell seriously delinquent on their loans.”

Authors Don Schlagenhauf and Lowell R. Ricketts looked at auto and student loan debt for the four largest metropolitan statistical areas in the Eighth Federal Reserve District: Louisville, Memphis, Little Rock and St. Louis. The report also explored auto and student loan debt by age groups and serious delinquency rates.

Regarding student loan debt, the authors concluded, “… a large share of young borrowers saddled with severely delinquent loans may inhibit aggregate economic growth as this group is unable to participate in other economic activities, such as buying a home or saving for retirement.”

For the full text of the February 2016 issue of In the Balance, visit the Center for Household Financial Stability online.

For further information on the metropolitan statistical areas or for general media inquiries, please contact Laura Taylor at 314-444-8783 or laura.taylor@stls.frb.org.