Where the Rebate Money Went

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Like this summer’s vacations, the economic-stimulus rebate checks that arrived in people’s mailboxes earlier this year have become a distant memory. So, where’d the money go? A Harris Interactive report released last week took a look at the matter — comparing people’s April predictions of how they’d use the money with their August reports on what they really did with it. Perhaps chastened by the economy’s travails, Americans were more prudent in their use of the money than they’d expected to be.

For instance, while 20 percent of the April respondents said they’d use at least some of the money to take a trip “for leisure purposes,” just 11 percent of the August recipients said they actually did so.

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