>On Tuesday, August 02, 2005 5:56 AM [PDT],
>Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
>> At 12:44 PM +0000 8/2/05, MarketWatch Alerts wrote:
>>
>>> Breaking News Bulletin: U.S. personal savings rate falls to 0%
>>> http://marketwatch.com/r.asp?g=2237C31ADC6F42989A34C063BE1ACED0&d=bnb
>
>
>That's good! Isn't this figure usually a negative number?
>
>I believe it has been, over the last 10 years or so...
>It must have climbed *above* zero at some point?
The only time it was ever negative since the national income accounts begin in 1929 was 1932 and 1933. (In fact there was an old rule of thumb that the difference between a recession and a depression is that savings rates rise in a recession and fall in a depression.) The savings rate averaged 8% in the 1980s, and 4% in the 1990s.
Doug