Social Media Leads NYers To Burn Through Cash, Survey Shows

NEW YORK — Call it the Instagram budget. Four in 10 New Yorkers say their friends' social media posts lead them to burn through cash — yet even more question how their pals fund such lavish lifestyles, a recent survey shows.

The investment firm Charles Schwab examined New York City residents' spending habits through its 2019 Modern Wealth Survey, which offers an annual look at how Americans think about money management.

Social media looms large in New Yorkers' financial lives, the results show. Some 40 percent of the New York City-area residents surveyed said social media influenced them to spend money on experiences.

While nearly two thirds — 64 percent — say they wonder how their friends afford the expensive experiences they share on social media, 39 percent said they spent more than they could afford so they could compete with their friends' activities, according to the survey.

"The burden to ‘keep up with the Joneses’ has been part of our culture for a long time, but it seems that social media has increased the pressure to spend," Abel Oonnoonny, a financial consultant at Charles Schwab's New York City branch, said in a news release.

The pressure is even stronger for millennials in the city, the survey suggests. More than half of the respondents in that age group said social media influences their spending, while 71 percent wonder how friends can afford their habits.

Those are both above the nationwide rates of 34 percent and 60 percent respectively, according to Charles Schwab.

The numbers may not be surprising given the results of a 2012 study in the Journal of Consumer Research that suggested greater social-media use is linked to higher credit-card debt.

But the outflow of cash might not matter much to many New Yorkers. Some 69 percent said feeling personally wealthy comes down to how they live their lives rather than a certain amount of money, they survey found.

Logica Research conducted Charles Schwab's survey from Feb. 13 to 27. The online survey included 500 New York City-area residents aged 21 to 75. The sample has a margin of error of four percentage points.