Lots of Debt Makes Young People Feel Like They're in Control

Money can't buy happiness---but debt might just be able to rent you self-esteem, a new study suggests. Being in the red seems to boost the self-confidence of people in their early-to-mid twenties, the researchers found. Using all sorts of data---financial, psychological, educational, you name it---collected every two years from 3,000 young adults as part of an enormous national survey, they were able to pick out this pattern: The more credit card debt and college loans young adults had, the higher their self-esteem and the more they felt in control of their lives. Even when the researchers took starting self-confidence into account---young people with higher self-esteem might be more willing to take out loans in the first place, for instance---the pattern remained. It's not clear cause and effect, since the researchers couldn't make some of the kids go into debt and the others say solvent, but it does suggest that being ...