I participated in a conference in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in August 20-21. Under the title “Finanças e Consumo”, it gathered sociologists and anthropologists from Mexico, Brazil and Argentina. The last two countries have experienced a period of high levels of GDP growth, with policies oriented towards sustaining internal demand. Financing low- and low middle-class consumption through credit has been part of this strategy. This raises questions about the sustainability of indebtedness, and about the political uses of the categories of “middle class” or “popular consumption”, which are often used by the economic and political actors involved in the process (be it celebrating or criticizing it), but which may be too broad to be used by social sciences to describe the concrete credit and consumption practices taking place.