A new federal report confirms that 4 in 10 Minnesotans would have trouble covering this unexpected expense.

The Federal Reserve Board releases a report each year, called the Report On The Well Being of U.S. Households. It's some (yawn) pretty exciting reading overall (<--- sarcasm font) but it did contain this tidbit, which several news sources picked up on again this year.

It's that 40% of families in the U.S. (and here in Minnesota) wouldn't be able to cover an unexpected expense of $400. Meaning that just under half of us here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes are living paycheck-to-paycheck so much that if, say, our car needed a $400 repair, we'd have to charge it to a credit card, borrow the money from someone else, or just not pay it.

However, that stat might be a little misleading, though. Because while 40% of people said they might charge that unexpected expense, many of that 40% would then pay that extra money off with their credit card payment the next month. So perhaps it's not that accurate of a statistic after all anyway.

And, this CNN story on the report notes that the percentage of us who can't afford that extra $400 expense has been declining for the past 5 years, down from nearly 50% who said they couldn't afford such an expense back in 2013. So that's good news. What about you-- could you afford an extra $400 expense?

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