by Michael Snyder, The Economic Collapse Blog:

Americans are going into debt as if tomorrow will never come, but of course tomorrow always arrives eventually.  What we are witnessing right now is truly a historic debt binge, and to many of the experts it seems like there is no end in sight to the unrestrained spending that is going on.  But are U.S. consumers going into record levels of debt because they are feeling good about things or because they are trying to survive in an increasingly harsh economic environment?  In America today, the cost of living has become exceedingly oppressive, employers are laying off large numbers of workers, and poverty and homelessness have been absolutely exploding all over the country.  Millions of U.S. households are just barely hanging on by their fingernails, and many desperate consumers have been piling up debt in a frantic attempt to stave off the inevitable.