The New Geography of U.S. Consumer Debt

There are few things more American than debt. Nationwide in the U.S., the average adult with a credit file now carries more than $50,000 worth of total debt, and more than one-third of American adults—77 million in total—had debt in collections last year, according to two new reports released Tuesday by the Urban Institute.

The reports focus on the geographic concentrations of debt across U.S. states and metro areas. The research, conducted in cooperation with Encore Capital Group's Consumer Credit Research Institute (CCRI), covered a random sample of 7 million adults based on 2013 credit information from TransUnion. (The roughly nine percent of adults with no credit file, generally low-income consumers, were not included). They collected data on total debt, mortgage date, debt past due, and debt in collections, among other measures, for the 50 states and 100 largest metro areas.