I don't think it's enough, though, when you're trying to stretch a $230 paycheck to $300 in expenses.
I don't think it's enough, either, when you look at how poor people get dinged with so many more fees than the less-poor whenever they go out to do anything in the world.
And I don't think most of the "save what you can" advice is particularly meaningful when you're telling people to put aside $10 a month. One big family gathering could wipe out a year's savings on food costs alone!
I think the first solution has to be getting people--especially the poorest--paid more for the incredibly taxing work poor people tend to do, like cleaning, cooking, all those jobs where you're on your feet 8, 10, 12 hours a day and your body's worn out by the time you're 40.
Oh and the decline of unions meant that workers lost their ability to successfully lobby their government, business meanwhile increased their lobby efforts.
So, I see the root causes as a rigged game against workers. (Rigged as the odds slightly against our favour, so we get just enough wins and benefits as to not realize that we are loosing overall).
Take 2 different scenarios:
1) Youth gets paid $4/hr (well below the minimum wage) to work in their chosen field as an apprenticeship. Graduates with a certification in their field with a little bit of money saved up, no debt, and real work experience.
2) Youth gets into massive student loan debt, gets a degree but has no real job experience or employment prospects. Has to work the next decade to pay off their student loans.
The one that makes the most sense and that would result in people being better off is illegal.
Two of the three would be the death knell for our economy, whereas the third is politically unpalatable.
My high school had a financial literacy requirement, but it was a half year class taught by one of the worst teachers I've had (very nice lady but like the computer teacher they were just riding out to retirement and relegated to these classes that were undersupplied and they weren't knowledgeable in), the content was out of date, and sparse. They cover things like writing checks, bank account creation, but I remember nothing covering how loans work or anything of that nature because the math required would make the class too tough for general education. The class was really something the school just paid lip service to as the state required it. It's a damn shame school's don't have better experiences because people enter the world totally unequipped for the financial predators that loom.
Loans (interest, and also contracts in general) are not required to be presented at a level that /most/ of the population can understand. There is a giant, thick, legal language contract that even if you are a lawyer you probably don't really understand (it hasn't been adjudicated, so you don't know what a judge feels it says).
Disclosure: I do use credit cards, but only as a convenient and insurance providing mechanism for accessing my bank account and recouping some of the fees built in to prices by the predatory banking industry.
In nature, getting between a mother and her baby is perhaps one of the most dangerous situations you can be in. very few predators, unless they are out of options, consider humans a viable meal. But even ruminants will potentially attack you to defend their young.
Trying to treat humans as cold calculators of utility is perhaps the worst idea economists have clung to over the years.
If you downvoted the parent of this comment and would like to help me do better in future, I'm all ears...
I say better financial education, and then the next step.