Setting priorities for financial survival - pay credit card bills, cancel mortgage payment

Luke Mullins, On Monday February 8, 2010, 2:49 pm EST

Amid high unemployment and sliding home prices, a growing number of struggling consumers are doing what was once considered unthinkable: paying their credit card bills instead of their mortgages...
The data reflects a "fundamental paradigm shift" in the way consumers prioritize payment of debt obligations, says Ezra Becker, of TransUnion. "This is dramatically different," he says. "It is a clear manifestation of the dynamics that lead up to the recession and the recession itself." --
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Comment: Yet what do you do when money does no longer cover credit card bills? What we can expect is a gradual move downwards of the priority level. First comes to cancel mortgage payments, then comes to cancel installment rates, and so on. Each round involves less money until one gets stuck with a barter economy. Welcome to the dark ages.