Credit card debt takes up bulk of spending
CONSUMERS are spending more repaying credit card debt than they are on new purchases.
A new report found that while spending is stabilising and may even start growing again next year, personal savings are at an all-time high.
Consumers spent €157m more paying off their credit card debt in September than they did on making purchases and this has been a growing trend in the last year compared with the boom years.
Personal savings are at 12.3pc of income -- it was 2pc at the peak in 2007.
Spending is likely to fall 1pc in 2010, much better than the 10pc fall last year, and growth of 0.4pc could be hoped for next year, said Professor Mary Lambkin of UCD Smurfit Business School, who wrote the Consumer Market Monitor report.
- Aideen Sheehan Consumer Correspondent
Irish Independent
