That infamous bankrate.com "study" is misleading in similar ways; they define terms in a way no reasonable person would to support a desired conclusion. Same for "retirement savings" and a bunch of other financial topics where the terms are misleadingly defined to create a dramatic headline. These are all clickbait articles that have been debunked countless times, and any careful reading of the studies indicates why.

Start from the well-sourced fact that median American households have ~$1000 per month to spend without sacrificing anything, and work from there. This can't be true at the same time all of those breathless headlines about broke Americans is also true. Without fail, if you dig into the details, the headlines are grossly misleading. The percentage of Americans that truly have no capacity to deal with significant unplanned expenses -- per Federal Reserve studies -- is 10-15%. A not inconsiderable number of people but far less than implied by the clickbait.

Average Americans have extraordinary amounts of discretionary income compared to almost anywhere else in the world. Americans both have a low savings rate and they have large amounts of money available to save.