Why Americans feel gloomy about the economy despite falling inflation and low unemployment
Inflation has reached its lowest point in 2 1/2 years. The unemployment rate has stayed below 4% for the longest stretch since the 1960s.
Because the 'numbers' that neoliberals have decided are the indicators of a "good" economy mean almost nothing to, in all likely hood, 95% of Americans.
Measuring the right thing leads to inconvenient conclusions (age till retirement, income at retirement, income independence, buying power, home ownership, business ownership, union membership, etc.)
Bloody well hate the neoliberals. One was arguing with me on reddit that because people in Kenya are better off, compared to the 80s, I should stop complaining.
Like ok I am happy for the people of Kenya. I got nothing against them. So yeah good job. Now can my healthcare costs please go down? Because I am pretty confident that they can and the people of Kenya can also be doing well. One really doesn't impact the other that much.
Fuck neoliberalism. Glad I found out what it was. It really highlights everything that is wrong with the American economy.
... because my purchasing power is much lower than two years ago and my wages aren't remotely keeping up with profiteering inflation? Because I have to be very careful around Christmas to not overspend and I get to explain to the kids why there's only a few presents under the tree? They'll be okay with it, but as a person who has children to take care of it, it's crushing to go backwards year to year in what you're able to provide? Because a 3/4 full shopping cart today (not much meat) was $179 today? And we have a fixed rate mortgage! I can't envision the pressures people who are renting or trying to buy a home right now are going through. Anyone saying "it's all good out there!" can get fucked.
No kids to take care of, but my fridge just went out today. This spoiled most of the food in the fridge as I can't pick up a new one until tomorrow, and the of a new fridge and restocking my fridge pretty much cancels Xmas gifts for the family. I feel bad every year because they get my wife and I all kinds of cool stuff and it seems like every year I'm stuck telling them, "Maybe I'll be less broke next year" Not quite the same, I know, but it still makes me feel aweful...
Meanwhile the owner of my company just bought a 5th wheel camper trailer and hitch for his truck in June because he felt like going camping, and is having a 6 bedroom house built for his son on his ranch because his sons wife is having a baby.
This world is fucked for the working class truly.
This isn't probably what you want to hear right now, but I've been much happier giving homemade gifts to family and friends. I found a couple of things people really enjoy that I make and they all look forward to it every year. For me, it's pork jerky. That might not work for you because you need a dehydrator but I can post the recipe if you want. It's a lot of work so no one ever makes it, but when they receive it for Christmas they know I put a lot of time and love in and I really think that's what Christmas should be about. It's really cheap... Mostly two or three large pork loins covers my entire Christmas list.
Other family members have started to do the same. My brother makes really good homemade caramel popcorn. My sister made some rum infusion to give out. Another sister even one time even made Dominoes somehow with resin.
If you are able to find time and energy to spread your love for your family and friends Christmas is a lot of fun.
If it isn't too late. Buy an absolute fuck ton of ice. It'll keep the food cold enough.
I can't believe how expensive thanksgiving shopping was this year. I hit nearly 200 dollars.
We hit $200 very easily just buying household essentials, it seems like. Heaven help us if we need paper towels, toilet paper, contact solution, the 'cheap' shampoo and conditioner, plus a few cleaning supplies all at the same time. $200 comes at you fast on those shopping days.
Dang, I was just thinking about how my mom got a raise years ago when I was still a kid and it practically changed our life. All of a sudden we were eating out more. All of a sudden we had nicer things. All of a sudden my mom wasn't stressed anymore.
It's sad to see how people are now experiencing the opposite of that. It's sad they're experiencing that when, in absolute terms, we are more productive than ever.
Greed really is the worst thing we face as a species in the modern age. It's a shame so many people are gung-ho about supporting it.
The disparity in wealth needs to shrink instead of grow. Otherwise, these problems will only get worse over time.
I feel like I have been seeing the same article once a month since 2007.
A. Unemployment numbers are basically a lie at this point. The only number that comes even close to representating the situation is the workforce participation rate. Question: what percent of people are employed? Answer: what percent of people are employed. It is simple as that. If you look at pretty much every month the US hits a new low. Over a third of the adult population did not earn $20 dollars last week. There was a slight trending down right before 2007 crash but not significant. A deep dive into the numbers shows that this is not the result of retirement, it is the result of prime working age males dropping out.
B. Who cares if inflation is low at this moment? That is like arguing that everything is fine the previous 5 minutes when a car crash happened 6 minutes ago.
Peices of garbage keep telling us that everything is fine when it fucking isnt
I really like that car crash analogy or whatever you want to call it. It isn't like sudden positive changes in inflation or job numbers magically fixes QOL for people overnight. It can take weeks...months, maybe even years (maybe even never?)
This is it exactly. Positive changes in inflation mean prices aren't going up as fast. They're still going up. They're never going to go down because businesses don't charge less when the alternative is making more money. They only ever charge more with inflation.
Checks out. Not a huge change but a definite trend.
Source: https://www.bls.gov/charts/employment-situation/civilian-labor-force-participation-rate.htm
Corporate profits ≠ my wallet
Corporate profits lt;- your wallet
Because it's a bullshit narrative. Cost of living keeps going up. But inflation doesn't count rent, groceries, or gas.
Rent is going to go up as long as it's able.
As soon as people have more money to spend, landlords increase rent.
Renting is one of the biggest scams this generation has convinced itself into falling for.
Hold on everyone, this 17 year old is gonna explain why we're all idiots
Because those two metrics are meaningless for the average person.
Inflation is trending down... After it skyrocketed and is still way above affordable ranges.
Employment rates are high... But those jobs don't pay living wages.
Go check how much savings the average American has, check what an average doctor's visit costs, and then maybe you'll understand the gloom.
Median figures are more accurate and scarier than average.
No one is asking for deflation. They're asking for wages that don't decrease every year due to inflation and companies not giving raises or giving raises so small that it's still a pay decrease since it's not keeping up with inflation.
Wages are now out pacing inflation. So it sounds like you're saying your gloomy about the economy because the president hasnt come in and forced your boss to give you a raise, or hand you a different job with more pay.
Wages may be outpacing inflation, but so have prices for a long time, and wages haven't reflected increases in productivity since around the 70s or so. In about 2015, I remember looking up some statistics and finding out that wages for the average worker had decreased about 5% since the 70s while CEO compensation had more than doubled, when you account for inflation. The most absurd example I can think of off the top of my head is that, when adjusted for inflation, the cost of a taco from Taco Bell has doubled since the 90s. There's some great comparisons out there, but some stuff has increased at more than double the rate of inflation since the 80s, with the biggest offender being the cost of college, which has increased by something like 1,153% (if I remember right, it's been several years since I've looked at those statistics).
Plus, local conditions never reflect the national averages/medians, so there are probably areas and industries that are seeing massive booms in wages and work to life balance and such, but there's others that aren't and some areas where even booming industries are seeing a decline. The IRS report for 2021 says that 51% of Americans made $15,000 or less that year. During my 20s (around the 2010s), I made $20,000-$30,000 a year working at a local fish market. This would put me probably somewhere around the top 45% of Americans by annual wages comparatively, but due to the high CoL in my hometown, I couldn't afford to rent a studio apartment. The lowest rent I found in that time was a single room in somebody's house with "occasional kitchen access" for $1,000 a month. Studio apartments started at $2,000 a month. The average American has something like $20,000 in their bank account, while the median American has $600.
I'm reminded of all the articles I see about people spending their "pandemic savings" where I think to myself, "What savings? The $1,000 check we got that some idiot of a politician said that everybody would be using to go buy a brand new car? 2 years ago they were talking about how we had all gone through the majority of our savings just to keep up with CoL increases."
Because interest rates are insane trapping people in homes they no longer want but can't afford to leave?
Speaking of... My car got totalled at the end of October, shopping for a new one, I saw interest rates for me between 7 and 8%, for other folks, I saw one as high as 12.25%(!) On a CAR LOAN.
Because interest rates are insane trapping people in homes they no longer want but can’t afford to leave?
I'm in this comment and I don't like it.
Interest rates should never have been that low to begin with. It was basically free money for the wealthy, and it's how housing became such an investment for big businesses. The rates we have now are still at historic lows, they just feel high compared to the bonkers low rates of the last couple decades. I understand the frustration 100%, but lowering the rates again is NOT the answer at all.
For Christmas dinner I vote we just eat the fucking rich
I agree, but we gotta be more thoughtful about it.
I recently had a crazy interaction where I was apparently "The Rich" that needs eaten because I landed a job with a good salary.
Working people aren't the enemy, needs to be made clear as well. Hell, even corporate headwigs raking in a few million aren't even close to your enemy in this regard either.
Sounds like jealousy honestly. I've had a couple conversations here in the past that because I went out and started my own electrical contracting business instead of working for someone that all of a sudden in the bourgeoise. Like, dude, why in the hell would I keep myself in a position of struggling when I have the skillset and knowledge to make a lot more money, though I'm in a small tourist town so it's not like I have a bunch of commercial contracts. I have one employee, who makes damn good money for an apprentice. I don't have health insurance because I can't fucking afford it without being back in the poor house. I ain't affording a house anytime soon, and my rent is $2k/month. Most of my gains for this year are going to be diminished because I have to buy a new truck to replace my old car with almost 200k miles on it, and interest rates are fucked. And then taxes take the rest because this country hates people striking out on their own. I make just enough to be slightly ahead of myself year over year, but my wife and I aren't on a beach in Bora Bora eating bons bons.
Point is, people are angry, and I get it, I'm pretty irritated too. But don't let people drag you down for your successes just because they're subscribing to the crabs in a bucket mentality.
"Why Americans feel gloomy about the economy despite paying a lot more for things than the official inflation numbers claim and having a wage that isn't rising as high as official numbers claim"
Not to leave out unemployment has run out for thousands, making the numbers look good.
Exactly. When my benefits ran out 2 months ago, I no longer showed up as unemployed. Thankfully, I finally got a job after nine months of anxiety.
While I have a better income than before, it's only about 10%, while prices on everything (that i need for daily survival) went up at least 20%, and food nearly doubled. No way I can get a house - those prices went up at least 40% here in the last 4 years. New car? Fuggettaboutit. Basic sedans going for 30k! Used ones probably for $24k, from what I read. Since when does COBRA at $1900 per month for one person make sense? It's a slap in the face.
Didn't the student loan moratorium also end? Something started back, maybe evictions too. None of it is good.
"falling inflation" means prices are still rising...the rate of increase is what has decreased. What we need is negative inflation...or said differently, price decrease.
You don't actually want that. It encourages people to "invest" by sticking hard cash in a mattress. It rewards people for doing absolutely nothing but taking money out of the economy.
Ideal (if we're keeping a monetary exchange society, anyway) is low (<3%), predictable inflation combined with wages increasing in proportion to productivity. We had a period of relatively low inflation followed by a giant spike, plus wage gains that are nowhere near matching productivity gains over the last 50 years, and that's where things hurt. Capitalism doesn't seem capable of this, however, as it's always chasing the next hype cycle that leads to these spikes and lulls.
As opposed to what we have going on right now, which is to punish working class people so ruling class people can still have prosperity.
What you are describing is deflation and it's only happened twice during the history of the United States. It is also generally looked at as a bad thing.
Is inflation generally looked at as a good thing or a bad thing? Ive only ever heard people complain about inflation.
If they are both bad things im willing to give the bad thing that improves my life a try over the bad thing that makes everything more expensive.
Granted i have nothing so im probably on the side of things that is least effected by the bad side of deflation.
If i can spend more money on the things i want to, it will absolutely help small local businesses near me
Deflation is a death spiral. China is going through it rn. The currency gets stronger, but then people wait to buy stuff like houses because it will be cheaper in a few months. It creates a snowball effect as people all start holding off on buying and selling stuff, wanting the best deal possible, or then being unable to buy things if people hold off on selling.
I can't remember the last time people felt good about the economy.
I can... but I was born in the 70s
I'd say it was pre-2008, but I was born in the 90s.
Doesn't take a genius to figure out that when the economy restabilizes, that doesn't mean the cost of consumer goods go down or wages go up, it just means the billionaires running the show aren't losing millions
My son graduated with a degree in economics in 2020 and still hasn't found a job. He's not counted in the unemployment numbers because he hasn't filed for benefits. We need to look at labor participation as well as underemployment instead of the useless stats being used in this article. Real wages have tanked. People are running up debt just to buy groceries. It's desperate out there.
He’s not counted in the unemployment numbers because he hasn’t filed for benefits.
That's untrue. From the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics:
In the Current Population Survey, people are classified as unemployed if they meet all of the following criteria:
- They were not employed during the survey reference week.
- They were available for work during the survey reference week, except for temporary illness.
- They made at least one specific, active effort to find a job during the 4-week period ending with the survey reference week (see active job search methods) OR they were temporarily laid off and expecting to be recalled to their job.
There are other statistics measuring unemployment claims, but when you hear, "the unemployment rate for Oct 2023 is 3.9%", that is unrelated to benefits.
Maybe it's because everyone is struggling with high costs of housing, food, and healthcare, among other things, while wages have remained flat and stagnant for decades.
I really wish news outlets would stop pretending this is some big mystery. Shit is too expensive.
IMO it's the inverse, we don't make enough. The 1% have been keeping wages stagnant. We can't stop the price of goods from going up, but we can increase pay from it sharing the bottom line. As soon as interest rates re-appeared, all the free money that was sitting around for the taking disappeared. Sooner than later, we'll be paying micro-transactions for crap that was previously able to be paid for by selling us ads. But that money isn't coming back to us.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.
Part of what's happening on this front (things are expensive) is antitrust-related.
Mergers and Acquisitions among competing companies, and 'vertical integration' along supply chains (both of which ought to get a lot more antitrust attention than they have for a long time) often means the resulting companies control supply enough that they can throttle supply and look, there's not enough of the things! Prices then go up- and the loss in productive capacity that happens when competing firms consume each other is behind those mysterious 'supply chain issues' that led to empty shelves during the pandemic.
The election wave immediately following Watergate swept a lot of then-young, centrist Democrats into the halls of congress- and in so doing, also retired the Democrats' institutional interest in anti-monopoly enforcement. Since then, neglecting antitrust enforcement on boring things like commodities and pharmaceuticals has been a bipartisan affair.
Someone feel free to explain these two simultaneous headlines-
People who feel bad buy things to feel better. They might not be able to afford a new house or a car or medical care, but they’ll spend something on gifts.
Also, maybe it’s members of the owning class buying things. They’re getting more money all the time, whether the economy does “good” or not. So they’ve always got money to blow on shit.
Plus it specifically says online sales. Online sales could be up 7.5%, but brick and mortar store sales could be down 50% for all we know.
Sure, no problem. Spending rose by 7.5%, inflation until recent months was at 10%. Net real sales is down by 3.5%. People are spending more for less. This is why we are gloomy. Still, I recognize things are getting better on the macro level.
The unemployment is low because people have a gun to their head. Inflation is falling, but it's not zero, therefore everything is still getting more expensive.
eCoNoMiCs.
"most prices are high and still rising" Pretty obvious that corporations are price gouging to get their friendly fascist lifetime dictator back in power.
My wife and I are making more money than we ever have in the past. However, before that I was unemployed and was forced to find some way to keep being able to buy groceries, gas for the car, and helping my wife pay bills. As such, the only way I saw to do so was to take out a credit card or two, and they quickly got maxed out. So now I’m stuck paying $700/month in credit card bills, as well as dealing with the increasing food and rent prices. Our bills take a larger percentage of our total wages than before. And sure, part of that’s my own fault, but at the time it was do what I did or starve and get evicted. I wasn’t about to let that happen to my wife.
We’re still able to survive, but it’s by the skin of our teeth.
I'm in a similar boat. Had to float on credit for months. When I eventually manage to get a job it means I'll be able to start digging myself out of a hole. Forget about being ahead.
Yeah, even utility bills are through the roof. I just got my October gas bill in the new house I'm renting, $150. I'm nervous to see what that's going to be in January, it's already cold and the furnace has been cranking.
Dang, it must be rough living on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
Not quite to that degree, but not far off.
$4 for a bag of potato chips.
25ct for 3 decent potatoes at my town.
SACK of 50 pounds for 12$ Wanna start a business?
Oh boy inflation is falling.
Unless it's greedy C-level execs falling out of windows there won't be a change in the cost. The issue is greed, inflation was just the scapegoat.
It also kinda glances over the fact that the boost of inflation is there permanently and this is the new baseline, and no wages have kept up to it at all while everyone is getting nickel and dimed to death.
100% this. It's great that inflation is only 4% now, but the price of nearly everything doubled since 2019, and wages, particularly for middle class and upper middle class have not increased enough. And the modest wage increases for the poor were used to further justify the price increases. And prices never go down, because "deflation=bad".
But, I will say that greedflation hit worldwide and the USA weathered it better than many other countries.
I don’t get this argument. If everything is greedily overpriced why not just go into business for yourself? Like if eggs are so overpriced, go buy chickens and start selling eggs. Prices will go down. Complaining about greed or expecting the government to do something won’t help anything. That’s the real reason Americans feel gloomy, they keep expecting someone else to do something, like the government or c-level executives.
I wish I lived in your fantasy world where individuals who are being adversely affected by the cost of eggs can still somehow magically not only afford the startup costs of a farm, and manage to not only sell eggs at prices beating out major agribusiness, but can also do so at a sufficient scale to affect system-level change. What absolute starry-eyed naivete.
I grow a lot of my own produce and am looking into a chicken coop, funnily enough.
I don't expect handouts or the government to step in. My point was that I'm not gonna cheer about inflation falling because the problem is something different entirely. Inflation is just a symptom of the real issue.
You can stop being obtuse and trying to deflect blame away from greedy corpo twats whenever you'd like.
Vibecession
THIS JUST IN! People raked over coals for nearly 4 years are feeling charred!
CEO's struggle to find uncharted adjacent talking points about the future economy as the middle class shrinks like a dick in a cold stream, as they unforgivablely pretend to scratch their heads while literally stealing babies from mothers. The statistics are IN, and they show that corporations do not care to provide safe as advertised products. Mothers, as expected, should be uneasy to have children since their offspring are not only more likely to have developmental problems due to microplastics in their bloodstreams, PFAFs in their bloodstream, and Teflon in their...um..everything... Along with the volatile markets, and sub standard pay increases that specifically affect everyone, except the A+ class that have trust fund money and live without feelings or care for any individuals, but the mothers must give birth for jesu... I mean for milit... I mean population contr...I mean moral values that age demographics that can't medically have children uphold. Wait. I meant because Jesus. I almost had it the first time. I really meant for Jesus. He was a swell guy, as long as you don't call him a middle eastern jew. Anyways, here's Jim with the latest CTE-ffective tackles from last night's game.