Household Borrowing Research Articles

Which Loans Do We Take? A Micro-Level Analysis of Croatian Households' Debt Participation

This paper uses a new data set in order to explore micro-level patterns of household borrowing in Croatia. By analyzing cross-section data from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey, conducted for the first time in Croatia in 2017, we present the structure of household debt holdings and identify several household characteristics associated with debt participation in three types of bank debt: secured debt, non-collateralized loans, as well as overdrafts and/ or credit card debt. Our results indicate that: a) households with middle-aged heads tend to participate more and hold larger amounts of all three debt types; b) credit constrained households are more likely to take non-collateralized loans; c) inability to finance consumption and willingness to take risks when making saving and investment decisions contribute to participation in overdrafts and/or credit card debt.

The necessity of small loans: the borrowing and lending among low-income earners in early 20th century Sweden

ABSTRACT It is difficult for households to match a low and fluctuating income with their expenditures. One short-term strategy for managing cash-flow problems is to turn to one’s social networks for support. This article describes and analyses the borrowing and lending of small loans (corresponding to one-two days of pay) among low-income earners and the role these loans had in the household economy. By analysing the detailed weekly reports in the Swedish cost of living survey 1913/14, it is possible to explain when and why households borrowed and lent. This was after a period of rising real wages in Sweden, yet surpluses were still small and a public safety net had only begun developing. More than half of the studied 118 workers and 105 lower officials, respectively, borrowed small sums. However, most just borrowed once or a few times over the year. To give a loan was less common than borrowing. Some lenders likely felt obliged to give loans to less well-off borrowers. Other households engaged in reciprocal borrowing and lending of small loans. Small loans were mostly used to handle income shortfalls and not expenditures shocks. Consequently, larger income fluctuations led to more borrowing among workers, unlike the level of household income. Being in a vulnerable position in the life-cycle with young children also increased the risk of borrowing among both workers and lower officials. However, income from adolescents did not seem to have mitigated cash-flow problems as older children increased household borrowing too. Lending declined after the start of WWI. This means that the source underestimates annual lending during peacetime conditions. However, the demand for loans remained largely constant, forcing workers in need to seek out other sources of credit. Still, households’ social networks played an important part in an incessant struggle to make ends meet.

Macroeconomic Determinants of Household Debt in OECD Countries

This article investigates the macroeconomic determinants of household debt in developed economies using a sample comprising 26 OECD countries for the period of 2002q1–2020q4. By resorting to the unconditional quantile regression, we find relevant asymmetries in the response of household debt. According to our results, economic growth leads to lower household debt, but the beneficial effect decreases as the level of household debt increases. Inflation lowers household borrowing only if the level of debt is high. Higher house prices lead to higher household debt, with the impact becoming stronger as the level of debt is higher. Investments go hand in hand with household debt, and higher investments lead to higher levels of borrowing, even when household debt is already high. Mortgage credit interest rates are positively linked with household debt, starting with higher debt levels. A rising unemployment rate leads to lower household debt, but the link becomes weaker as the level of debt increases. Higher public expenditures are generally associated with lower household debt. In addition, we find that household debt exhibits very powerful autoregressive behavior, being difficult to reduce rapidly in the case of need.

The Impact of Macroprudential Policy Instruments on Financial Stability in Southern Europe

Abstract This paper is a contribution to the body of research examining the impact of macroprudential policy instruments on financial stability. The following hypothesis was tested (H1): Macroprudential policy instruments (household borrowing costs; interbank loans as a percentage of total loans; loan to deposit ratio; leverage ratio; and solvency ratio) enhance financial stability, as measured by credit growth, in four southern European economies (Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain) from Q4 2010 to Q4 2018. The empirical results of this study suggest that, of the investigated macroprudential policy instruments, household borrowing costs, interbank loans as a percentage of total loans and loan to deposit ratio exhibit the predicted impact on credit growth rate. Leverage ratio and solvency ratio do not exhibit the expected impact on the response variable. Moreover, only three out of the five explanatory variables are statistically significant in the model. Consequently, it is not possible to confirm or reject the hypothesis based on the available data and results.

Job Polarisation and Household Borrowing

Job Polarisation and Household Borrowing

How Financially Fragile can Households Become? Household Borrowing, the Welfare State, and Macroeconomic Resilience

How Financially Fragile can Households Become? Household Borrowing, the Welfare State, and Macroeconomic Resilience

BORROWING ALTERNATIVES FOR HOUSEHOLDS IN LITHUANIA: CURRENT SITUATION, TRENDS AND CHALLENGES

Purpose – to analyse the main borrowing alternatives available to Lithuanian households and the credit market as a whole, focusing on its peer-to-peer (P2P) segment, the forecast of its growth, and possible challenges. Research methodology – the research methods applied were scientific literature analysis, statistical data analysis, comparative analysis, correlation-regression analysis, linear trend forecasting method. Findings – the prevailing borrowing alternative for Lithuanian households still remain bank credits. Besides, borrowing from P2P market is becoming more and more popular. Although the macroeconomic environment for all the credit market segments is the same, the P2P segment is developing significantly faster. If this trend remains unchanged, the whole credit market is likely to face challenges, such as the growth of overdue loans, insolvent customers, the rising share of non-performing-loans (NPL), etc., that may affect its overall stability. Research limitations – the empirical study relies on the country’s macroeconomic indicators that influence household borrowing. Such factors as borrower’s age, income level, marital status and others were not taken into account in this study. The forecast of the P2P segment growth of the consumer credit market and comparison with its banking segment is based on the analysis of 4 years of real monthly statistics for both segments. Practical implications – the performed analysis and its results can be useful for the future research within the household borrowing trends, especially in Peer-to-Peer platforms, and specifically for the Central Bank, the Ministry of Finance and other institutions that regulate the credit market, as it provides information on modern borrowing trends and the challenges it might bring. Also, for P2P platforms themselves, planning and further developing their activities and adjusting lending conditions with the aim to attract higher-quality customers. Originality/Value – household borrowing, the credit market and the P2P platforms are widely analysed by both academics and financial institutions, such as central banks. However, it is mainly limited to the analysis of statistical data and does not pay attention to possible market development issues. This study focuses on the analysis of the growth trends of the P2P market and the potential challenges that may arise thereafter.

Credit cycles with market-based household leverage

We develop a general equilibrium model in which households’ mortgage leverage is determined by supply and demand forces, where the price of credit impacts the quantity of leverage households choose. Mortgages are supplied by financial intermediaries, who offer households a menu of mortgage contracts whose pricing varies with intermediaries’ equity capital. In the model, growth in the demand for safe assets that replicates the falling interest rates in the 2000s causes an empirically realistic boom in household borrowing, debt-financed consumption, and house prices. This boom results in a larger bust in asset prices and household borrowing in future financial crises.

Determinants of household over-indebtedness in South Africa

The proportion of household debt to disposable income is high in South Africa, signifying over-indebtedness which reduces the welfare of households. High debt leads to low savings, negatively impacting economic growth. This paper presents the determinants of household debt distress in South Africa and comes up with recommendations on how to manage household debt. The objectives are achieved through systematic literature review. Findings suggest that households are over-indebted because of several reasons. They lack necessary finance management skills and proper protection from predatory practices by lenders. Household indebtedness is also caused by the rising cost of living which leads to low household disposable income and savings, high interest rates, misfortunes and adverse trigger events and income inequalities. Education, age and being a recipient of a social grant all have positive and negative impacts on household indebtedness. Findings also suggest that female-headed households, renting households, large households, urban based households, households with a mortgage and households where the head is not working, is sick or disabled are more likely to be over-indebted. A framework is presented with recommendations on how household debt can be effectively managed in South Africa. Upskilling in finance management can help improve the way households manage their finances. Moneylending institutions should avoid predatory lending and disclose vital information affecting household borrowing decisions. A downward review of interest rates on debt is necessary with a balance between profitability and sustainability of loan repayments. Consumption insurance on loans is recommended to cushion debt distressed households.

State dependence of monetary policy across business, credit and interest rate cycles

We study how phases of the business, credit and interest rate cycles affect the transmission of monetary policy using state-dependent local projection methods and data from 18 advanced economies. We find that the impact of monetary policy shocks on output and other macroeconomic and financial variables is weaker during periods of economic downturns, low household debt, and high interest rates. The business cycle state dependence tends to dominate the other documented state dependencies. We build a small-scale theoretical model to rationalize these facts. The model points to the presence of collateral and debt-service constraints on household borrowing and refinancing as potential drivers of state dependence of monetary policy with respect to the business, credit, and interest rate cycles. Our findings bear significant implications for the transmission of monetary policy, and highlight potentially important features to be considered in models used to inform monetary policy decisions.

Do social interactions matter for borrowing behaviour of the Europeans aged 50+?

PurposeThis paper aims to explore the linkage between households' social interactions and credit context and how these interactions may influence household borrowing decisions.Design/methodology/approachBased on a sample of 45,907 individuals referred to 18 countries, drawn from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe, different probit regressions are used to test the four hypotheses proposed.FindingsEmpirical evidence confirms that intensive and extensive sociability are positively related to consumer debt holding. However, when social activities are considered separately, there is weak evidence that they are also related to mortgage debt holding and over-indebtedness. Moreover, at this level of analysis, the different nature of the social activities in which the individual participates in may condition the relationship with borrowing behaviour. The findings also show that relative income plays a passive role in household borrowing behaviour, since low-income households are more likely to hold mortgage and informal loans or to be over-indebted in highly indebted countries.Originality/valueFirst, this paper extends the knowledge of the relationship between social interactions and borrowing behaviour by considering not only the intensity and diversity of the social activities in which the individual participates, but also the different nature of these activities. Second, it proposes that social interactions may play a passive role on borrowing decision, suggesting that household's behaviour might be passively affected by the density of borrowers surrounding it. To the best of our knowledge, there has not been any attempt to test this issue regarding household borrowing decisions. Third, unlike the few empirical papers on the topic, the paper also analyses previous issues by distinguishing between different types of debts; a distinction that revels the different role played by social interactions.

THE EFFECT OF CONSUMER CONFIDENCE ON AGGREGATE HOUSEHOLD CONSUMPTION AND LEVERAGE

Consumer confidence measures and their effects on macroeconomic variables have been subject to extensive research since it was devised in the 1940s. Some empirical studies suggest that it is one of the leading causes of macroeconomic fluctuations through its effects on household consumption. Particularly, consumer durables spending and household borrowing are found to be sensitive to consumer confidence. In this study, a stock-flow-consistent system dynamics model is developed to explain how consumer confidence affects the aggregate household behavior and the macroeconomic dynamics of the economy. The simulation results confirm that consumer confidence strongly affects the economy's dynamic behavior. It is shown that the psychological and structural parameters determine the stability properties of the economy.

Focusing on both sides of the balance sheet

Debt has become a significant issue among U.S. households with average household interest pay- ments on liabilities exceeding expected returns on investment assets by more than 50%. In this study, we explore the role of U.S. household debt and analyze the impact of different economic, demo- graphic, and behavioral factors on household borrowing decisions, with a particular focus on “good” and “bad” debts, which depend on type and interest rate. We estimate significant potential benefits with improved liability management and find that households with lower asset, income, and educa- tion levels are likely to benefit most from assistance with debt optimization.

Are Policy Analogies Persuasive? The Household Budget Analogy and Public Support for Austerity

AbstractPublic opinion on complex policy questions is shaped by the ways in which elites simplify the issues. Given the prevalence of metaphor and analogy as tools for cognitive problem solving, the deployment of analogies is often proposed as a tool for this kind of influence. For instance, a prominent explanation for the acceptance of austerity is that voters understand government deficits through an analogy to household borrowing. Indeed, there are theoretical reasons to think the household finance analogy represents a most likely case for the causal influence of analogical reasoning on policy preferences. This article examines this best-case scenario using original survey data from the United Kingdom. It reports observational and experimental analyses that find no evidence of causation running from the household analogy to preferences over the government budget. Rather, endorsement of the analogy is invoked ex post to justify support for fiscal consolidation.

A Social Policy Theory of Everyday Borrowing: On the Role of Welfare States and Credit Regimes

AbstractDebt has become an essential part of many people's daily lives. This article develops a new comparative political economy perspective on the relationship between welfare states and household borrowing. I argue that the ways in which welfare states distribute benefits, and credit regimes provide access to credit, affect how individuals address social risks and, as a consequence, shape patterns of indebtedness. Permissive credit regimes substitute for social policies in limited welfare states, pushing economically disadvantaged groups into debt. Alternatively, credit markets complement social policies in the provision of financial liquidity in comprehensive welfare states, protecting vulnerable groups through government benefits while allowing less‐protected affluent groups to borrow money. In restrictive regimes, people instead rely on savings, expenditure cuts, and family support. I test these arguments using an original measure of credit regime permissiveness, cross‐national survey data, and full‐population administrative records from Denmark and panel data from the United States.

Troubles with the Chf Loans in Croatia: The Story of a Case Still Waiting to Be Closed

In numerous Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries, the global financial crisis as well as the unpegging of the foreign exchange rate of the Swiss franc (CHF) against the euro amplified the repayment troubles of households with the outstanding CHF-linked debt. In Croatia, the CHF loans were approved mainly as mortgages to unprotected and subprime household borrowers without sufficient credit capacity for long-term euro-linked loans, which also contained a possibility of an incremental interest rate change, i.e., the so-called administrative interest rate. This article aims to disclose the reasons behind the credit boom of these loans, the unsustainable CHF debt hardship that the household sector consequently faced, and how it was/could have been resolved, with the Croatian banking sector at the center of the research. Although the CHF case of Croatia has some specificities concerning the prudential regulation and government-sponsored loan conversion, the findings about the supply and demand determinants of the CHF credit boom, as well as a critical assessment of the Croatian government and central bank interventions, might be useful for timely noticing universal threats from the exotic currency-linked loans for the systemic risk and financial stability, and for minimizing the negative externalities from probable debt relief measures. Based on the descriptive and univariate statistics conducted on Bloomberg and the Croatian National Bank (CNB) data, it was found that interest rate differentials and carry trading behavior were the main reasons for the rapid CHF credit growth in Croatia. Nevertheless, according to the financial experts’ opinions obtained via a questionnaire survey, and the court verdicts reached since, the financial consumer protection when contracting these loans was severely violated, which implies that the central bank must enhance its consumer protection role. By adopting a single-country and holistic approach, this is the first paper that deals with the socioeconomic dynamic of the CHF credit default issues in Croatia, which might be interesting as a case study or for making comparison with other CEE countries that have been coping with negative consequences of Swiss francization.

What is the size of credit card debt in Brazil? Reporting Thresholds, Interest Rates and Income Distribution

Before its severe recession in 2014, Brazil saw a large expansion in household borrowing. We document that the magnitude of credit card debt has been shrouded by reporting thresholds and other methodological choices in bank reporting to credit registry data. This has given room to erroneous perceptions concerning the success of recent public policies aimed at reducing consumer credit risk. Using survey data from 18,000 households we show that credit card debt is widespread, expensive and prone to falling in arrears. This qualifies the role of government-induced credit supply to emphasize the channel of interest rates.

Does Household Borrowing Reduce the Trade Balance? Evidence from Developing and Developed Countries

We examine the dynamic impact of household borrowing on the trade balance using data from 33 developing countries and 36 developed countries over the 1980-2017 period. Our findings suggest that the impact of household borrowing on the trade balance is by and large negative, both in the short and long run. We show that household borrowing’s adverse effects on the trade balance are more pronounced but less persistent in developing countries.

Contemporary Macroeconomic Outcomes: A Tragedy in Three Acts

The thesis developed in this paper is that contrary to the claims of its proponents, the main supply-side consequence of neoliberalism was to zap labour, institutionalize worker insecurity, and install an `incomes policy based on fear' in the US economy. Like any successful incomes policy, this diminished confliict over shares of real income and so reduced inflationary pressures - but at the cost of decoupling real wage growth from productivity growth. This last outcome fueled rising income inequality and hollowed out the wage-funded, consumption-led core of the demand-generating process. The demand-side weakness of the neoliberal economy was initially concealed by household borrowing that debt-financed increases in autonomous consumption spending. But it has asserted itself in the wake of the Great Recession, following the exhaustion of the household debt accumulation process. The result was a depressed upswing 2009- 2019 that addressed none of the fundamental structural weaknesses evident in the US economy prior to the Great Recession. The institutionally entrenched but exhausted neoliberal paradigm left the US unprepared for the onset of recession in 2020, and for the larger social and economic travails of the COVID-19 pandemic with which the initial onset of the 2020 recession was associated.

Low Interest Rates and the Distribution of Household Debt

We study how changes in interest rates affect the borrowing of households and the distribution of debt within the population. In a model of household borrowing with credit constraints and endogenous house prices, we show that less constrained households with more pre-existing housing wealth increase their borrowing most when interest rates fall. We then use unique loan level data on the universe of household credit in Belgium to document a shift in the distribution of debt over age, with older households borrowing more as interest rates fell in the last decade. First-time borrowers, who are more likely to be constrained, do not contribute to the rise in household debt. To identify the elasticity of household debt to the interest rate, we use regulatory data on foreign exposures of banks and on the location of bank branches. We find that a 1 percentage point fall in the interest rate is associated with a 15% growth in household debt.