To suggest that a solo parent living on benefit has scope for increased saving is absurd, and would be presumptuous in the extreme coming from me. But it is also true that too many New Zealanders on higher incomes still have attitudes to their personal finances that only made sense in the high inflation 1970s and early-1980s.
The mind-set was that only a fool had personal savings, and the quick and the clever were in debt up to their eyeballs. Indeed, those attitudes were sensible from an individual’s point of view, with negative real interest rates and rising asset prices. Those attitudes no longer make sense.