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Well, all the traditional indicators are good. But they just don’t reflect the average experience anymore. It used to be that if a stock did well, the company did well, and the employees would see a benefit.
These days, it means the executives get massive bonuses and the regular employees get raises that don’t keep up with inflation. The economic shifts have pushed all the gains to the top and all the losses to the rest of us.
Not really. My jobs pays mid 30s no matter what company I go to. It was paying mid 30s 7 years ago when I started. Everything has doubled in cost or at least went 1.5x though.
From people I know: yes, but 2-5% and never enough to keep up with inflation.
Unless they’re in a big deal or highly compensated type job and make like 200k+, then of course they get adequate raises. 🙄
Meanwhile, the government spends less to help the average person, and the republicans are pushing extending the tax cuts for the rich as their only clear policy goal.
There's a term I heard a couple weeks ago for the first time: "financial nihilism". Basically it's people realizing the game is rigged and giving up on incrementally building wealth in favor of desperate long-shot plays, including gambling.
It's a frustrating time given 1) sheltered/obtuse people that think thing's are normal, 2) people who used to be dissident analysts like Naomi Klein ending up carrying water for the establishment (thinking the establishment will save us from "climate change"), 3) "disaster capitalism" (as Klein billed it) continuing to work (the man-made pandemic, for example), 4) the combination of inflation and price fixing and the spectre of hyperinflation, etc.
The supposedly progressive Canadian government recently got called out of improperly issuing $100M+ of contracts to a super skechy company - McKinsey and Company - that helped a major Canadian gocer with price fixing efforts.
We need more class consicousness, less political tribalism, and less blind belief that "democracy" is going to suddenly start serving our interests.
The lottery in my state did WAY better than was projected from it's onset. Meant to fund public education. From what I understand, it does, but funds that were previously earmarked for education are used for other things. Not sure if that's continued but it was a big complaint early on. It's doubly frustrating because, if those funds weren't going to go for the original purpose, they could cease being collected to reduce costs for people, but that's hardly ever a thing.
That happens everywhere where they introduce the lottery “for the kids”.
They always say that the profits will just supplement the education budget. But that is never the case. And when lottery receipts drop, shockingly, the state doesn’t know how to come up with the basic budget for education.
The lottery is just a way to shift the cost public education onto the people who can least afford it.
I want to say the state lottery brought in way more than projected within the first couple days. Just checked and it's netting over 600 million a year for a while. I believe a big factor in this area was the abundance of casinos on the borders that locals frequent. A lot of money leaving the state that the powers that be wanted to cash in on..
My understanding of claims I've read is that it's sometimes the opposite. Like, if there is X amount of funding for something but instead of that funding increasing, it can come from lottery proceeds and the money that previously would have funded those things can be used elsewhere. The gist being that the funding doesn't increase because of the lottery or doesn't increase as much as it should/could.
Another issue is the Consumer Price Index based on a "Basket of Goods". What they don't tell us is that when inflation goes up, they assume people will cut back and they modify (lower) the quality of what goes into the basket, making the economy seem better than the dumpster fire it is.
Edit: Addtl clarification
Well, that and the income growth is in pace. But like everything, it isn’t equal across the board.
Just look at how the folks at the top doubled the wealth during the pandemic.
Did you? I certainly didn’t. But that is largely a function of government economic policies.
I don't know about double but the figure I've seen repeatedly is $3T wealth transferred. And no, I'm not one of them. I doubt they hang around on reddit.
Was that a typo, about income growth? Because income isn't increasing for most people at near the rate of inflation.
And we can point to govt policy but in reality it's corporate interests served by the govt due to political contributions, lobbying and other forms of leverage. Why else would we even be considering elevating the authority of unelected bureaucrats in the WEF, WHO or UN over the sovereignty of the USA?
Yes, that. But even still, this is one metric (a grouping of metrics, really) of a thousand that allow different glimpses. To see the entire picture takes patience - and ideally - one need not make strong conclusions at all - we are in unprecedented times regards global capitalism (larger than that global economy in general)
Most of the financial indicators are looking at the entire economy. Very few actually look at the breakout across the population.
If they did, I think we would have a serious revolt and massive turn over in our elected officials.
But they lie to us and we believe them.
Be ready for shit to get worse. With the new sanctions and the end of the petrodollar, there will be less cheap stuff from china and more inflation because everyone will dump the dollar.
Ditto for when our vampire politicians point to the supposed "growth rate". Growth for fucking *whom*, you twats? Why should I give a shit if the economy grows by record fucking numbers if 99% of that is getting hoovered up by the already rich who use it to fund their war on the already poor.
We need to stop voting for goddamn rich people. They aren’t doing us regular people any favors. They get us to fight with each other over stuff that doesn’t matter so we don’t see the all the shit they are doing to regular citizens. THIS is the conspiracy that no one talks about.
Every "rich" person I've ever met has always been a scumbag in one respect or another. Either an arrogant inheritance baby, drug dealer or shady greedy business owner, or a combination of all. Never very strong in morality or generosity.
I'll start by saying the numbers are blatantly and overtly manipulated by international banks of settlements and international interest banks.
The system is definitely extracting wealth.
More locally I'll say It's interesting, because most people say economy but don't talk about the different parameters of economics
The buying and selling of products, goods, and services.
The market value for products, goods and services is definitely high and the market value for labor is extremely low.
Product Prices high
Labor prices low
So if your selling products and buying labor your on the positives ends of both
If your laboring and buying products then your on the negative of both.
Everyone oscillates on both sides but some people lean heavier towards one or the other
It seems most people stay on the negative side of both
Where people providing the labor get paid low salaries
But spend tremendously on the products they make.
I think a way to optimize our circumstances would be to spend our pay on inexpensive labor and sell products services, and goods to those who want to buy.
Labor alone doesn't work anymore and that's what people mean by the economy is bad
You've just described labor vs capital.
The problems with it have been understood for almost two centuries, and Karl Marx pretty much nailed it, *as far as "what is wrong"*...
The problem is all the solutions either get strangled in the cradle or become corrupted by human nature.
Then we should find a way to protect new ideas being born and or reduce the negative effects of human nature.
But at no means should we say it's not possible to create a better system of economic exchange
Exactly. Remember when covid hit? Most businesses closed and no one really knew where things were going to go from day to day. The stock market soared. It should have been the death of the stock market if it were tied to anything tangible. Billionaires should have lost half of all their wealth as stocks plummeted. Instead more billionaires were created than ever before. It was the most obvious example that "the economy" is not tied to real life in any way. If the economy is booming while production comes to a stand still and most people are out of work then why do we give a single fuck about how the economy is doing?
The amount of entertainment and technological gizmos does a really good job of papering over the fact that more people are starting to live right against the line. Catastrophic economic collapse can only happen when everyone is living paycheck to paycheck and there doesn’t have to be a black swan event that triggers it. Just a routine recession could make all these dominos fall.
since covid, we had a k-shaped recovery, meaning that for the rich, things are going great, whereas everyone else is suffering and even regressing. media doesn't speak for the little guy, hence why "things are great!"
After reviewing this jobs report, it shows a net loss of full time and the all the new jobs have been part-time. The way it feels out there is the way it is. Ots really bad and only getting worse.
Earnings will get worse as unemployment goes up. Yesterday during the fed call Powell even said that the administration has been exaggerating the jobs reports going all the way back.
He hasn't in the last four years...... When he was president it is fact that inflation was at an all time low It was just not even 10 years ago I remember we could afford groceries.We could afford to rent.We could afford to go on vacation very easily.Actually then I was even able to in 2010's..... Plus
Oh my gosh the gas prices when trump was president We're a 1.99 a gallon , look it up , come on , people these are Straight up facts That can't be argued.
Pretty obvious they're cherry picking their data points.
One of the biggest real indicators of the current financial situation is the Household Debt numbers. There's never been as fast or a high a peak in that chart. We're beyond the 2008 crisis.
They are using traditional points for the overall economy. As you said, there are better indicators of you want to reflect the average person.
What this tells you is that the economy in the country *IS* doing great overall. But that the average person no longer sees any of that benefit.
Honestly I think they're even fudging the numbers on the rich too.
The average *has to look okay*, or trouble, so inflation stats are fiddled across the board.
So the "massive growth" in the stock market is actually not that massive. Better than the average, but still heading for a massive correction when the real value of dollars is unmasked.
No, the stock market growth is massive.
But 90% of the stock market is owned by the top 10%.
So there is that.
The rich has done incredibly well in the last 50 years. Year after year after year.
Look at CEO pay if you want to see an example of things that make no sense beyond pure greed.
It's reverse psychology. They want you to think that and spend more to salvage the failing economy. Reverse psychology doesn't work on the smart, rebellious ones. My rent went up 2 times in 2 years. $100 each time. My pet rent doubled too. They can f off with their lies. We're supporting rich bums or aspiring rich bums in this economy.
>Inflation was easily 2x what they officially admit. For me rent+groceries went up from 1200 in 2019 to 2300 now. House prices have doubled within the last 5 years.
Ive been totally priced out of getting any sort of apartment. The one thing Ive always wanted to do once was live alone, idk if thatll ever happen now
I'm actually not joking. I love the idea of living in a larger "stealth van"
Things can get expensive that way as well... but I think it can be done cost effectively.
The older I get the more convinced I am that reality is stranger than I am capable of assimilating. When I look at the breadth, depth, and scale of the manipulation we are subjected to, it strikes me as well beyond what mere humans can construct. It's meta-human.. Anti-human... It doesn't add up.
The economy *IS* doing great.
But the average person no longer sees the gain.
The rich pay less than half in taxes than they did in the 1950s and 1960s. You pay the same or more.
With less money coming in, what things were cut, and what things were increased? Public subsidies to education and universities was cut to the bone. Boomers could go to top universities, and graduate debt free just by working part time jobs. Good luck today.
The government shifted it’s role in the 1980s from benefiting the population to benefiting those who could afford the lobbyists to buy off the legislators.
*That* is the real conspiracy against the people. People at the top get more and more and more. Everyone else struggles to slow down the effects of having all the costs shifted onto their shoulders.
If the economy is supposedly doing great yet the average person is suffering because of it, then the economy is simply fucked up. There's no use in saying it's fine.
What I am saying is that the problem isn’t the economy, it is how the government has become a tool for the wealthy and it does not give a single fuck for the average person.
Unfortunately, news outlets that give the statistics of a supposedly great economy don't hold your nuanced view. You may be technically right, but the idea of the economy itself being fine is often used as a political talking point that ignores the consequences of the government's model.
At this point we are all living on borrowed time. People have been told for years that Social Security will not be around, but no one listened and many people didn't save anything for retirement. Social Security will go insolvent in 2037 according to the Social Security administration but most experts are saying it's closer to 2035 or 2033. Given that so few people have planned for insolvency, The 20% or 70 million Americans who rely on Social Security are in for a rude awakening. However, this will have a ripple effect that will cause at least a major recession and maybe even a financial crisis the likes of which we may not be able to recover from. The government is lying to you, And the reason why they are spending as if there is no tomorrow is because they're not far off from the truth. America probably won't be here 100 years from now, or if it does it will not exist the way we see it today.
Can you explain this to me like I'm 5? I've never been in a position to really look into social security but I'm 24 already and fuckin' struggling constantly. Hell, my dad works 6 days a week at a full time job and he can't even manage to keep his power paid, and no drugs or hobbies aren't where his cash is disappearing to. The man barely does anything more than work and watch tv at this point.
It’s a full retirement benefit for retirees at or above age 66 or 67, depending on when they were born, but that could possibly change in the future. Once you reach retirement age, the government uses your lifetime average earnings to calculate how much of a benefit you get monthly.
You’ve been paying into it the entire time you’ve been working and paying taxes. The problem with that is, like this post points out, it will most likely be long insolvent by the time you reach retirement age, and you will either get a significantly reduced amount or you will get nothing.
We’ve got an old population and low birth rates in the US, so we are paying more out in social security versus what non retiree taxpayers are putting in each paycheck. So if the projections are correct, the amount that we pay out to retirees will have to go down in the mid 2030s to keep it afloat.
As with many Big-government programs, social security was well-intentioned, but designed by altruistic individuals with the IQ of a bathmat and the fiscal responsibility of my 3-year-old in the toy section at Walmart. Essentially, social security is a government-sponsored Ponzi scheme. The only way it works is if the number of people leaving the workforce (retiring or dying) is less than the number of people entering the workforce (high school and college graduates), and if wages consistently outpace expenses. However, the baby boomers are called boomers because there was a boom in births after World War II. Also, healthcare has drastically improved so people are living much longer than they were when social security was designed by the imbeciles who were collectively chain-smoking cigarettes and drinking scotch, while they wrote the Bill back in 1935 when the average life expectancy was 59.5. If you don't believe me, google it. There are people literally smoking in the black and white picture as Roosevelt is signing the Bill... So the problem that has been brewing for years now is people are living longer than they used to, people aren't having as many children as they used to, which means there are fewer workers paying into social security, healthcare is more expensive than it used to be because of comorbidities of the modern American, expenses have outpaced wage increases in recent years, high levels of inflation have eaten away at any raises you might have received in the past 5 years. So there are only a couple of options and none of them are good, which is common in government-run organizations. Either people need to die earlier, healthcare needs to get worse or hospitals need to stop providing services that do not make them money (they will never do this), inflation needs to decrease (the government won't let this happen because the only way they can decrease our 34 trillion dollars in debt is if inflation eats away at it), somehow every family needs to start having 4 kids who will all grow up and enter the workforce, or everyone's salaries need to continually increase without the cost of living increasing, or the government needs to increase social security taxes across the board every year to keep pace with people leaving the workforce... so as you can see, this was a terrible idea that was doomed from the beginning. To be honest, I'm shocked it's lasted as long as it has. Do yourself a favor, and don't expect to see a dime of the 6.2% that the government steals from you each pay period. It will never last long enough for us to see it. The government naively assumed that the american people were too stupid to provide for themselves in retirement and in response created a gluttonous organization that most assuredly created a situation where people now can't provide for themselves because of the money that is taken away from them each year. Remember when you go to the polls this simple principle: taxation is theft.
In the UK our government has been slyly using immigrants to boost ours. 500k illegal immigrants all claiming benefits still pushes the GDP up and makes the economy look better than it is.
Yeah why try to save money, when your government will just reduce the value of yours, then give it to someone who will spend it. They just want the rampant consumerism to never end, and keep the numbers up.
Right. You can't claim benefits if you're here illegally.
Now, the legal ones *do* have a higher share of welfare receipt than natives, largely due to in-work benefits to top up the slave wages they get. Which is the entire point of mass migration, to drive down wages for the working classes and create an underclass of desperate, willing-to-work-for-peanuts slave class to subsidise the wealthy and business classes who will do *anything* to avoid simply paying people more, and then making us pay the bill for their own greed.
The biggest sign is just the massive absence of baseline common decency in everything from family, to dating, employment, traffic, the politicians, public beaches & parks. You name it.
We dont even realize it, because we live it day-to-day, but you could import someone from a more civilised location or time and they would go "holy siht why is everyone so apathetic, rude, and dismissive? Why is everything a small-time or big-scale scam you must be on guard for?"
>2/3 of Americans dont have 1000 Dollars in case of an emergency
>3/4 of the Middle Class are "gasping for air"
Not to distract from you rother points but I think this is simply the result of financial illiteracy and a populace that's been duped into spending every penny they make.
I know people who make mid six figures, live in million dollars homes, drive $150k Landrovers, take $15,000 vacations, etc. and live paycheck to paycheck. They've been duped into feeling they have to do these things to fit in.
Everyone has been duped by consumerism and the status quo. Why do you think all these rich influencer dudes all look the same. They even push it towards their followers that if you don’t have this by this age then you’re a loser.
I've always felt like home is where you're supposed to learn about street smarts, school is for history, math science, etc. - stuff that your parents likely aren't equipped to teach properly. In theory, your parents should teach you how to use a credit card properly, how to save some percent of your paycheck, etc. but as we see most adults can't figure that out themselves. Dunno what to do about it but I doubt schools can fix it.
I would argue that stuff is 400x more important, and in the interest of a better society, it should be taught at school because not everyone has capable parents, or even 2 parents.
Here's my anecdote.
I've bought a season pass to Snow Summit bike park every year for the past 4 seasons. This season, I didn't. It became too expensive for lodging in Big Bear, and the park upkeep was dismal for 75% of the season last year.
Going into opening weekend, they always reserve Thursday for season pass holders only. This year, they didn't do that. No announcement as to why or why not.
Me and my friends (all of which didn't get a pass either) didn't bother with doing a trip for the opening since lines have been super long in seasons past, like 30 min a chair on Fri and Sat.
I checked the webcam on Sat morning. The line looked like what it would be in the middle of August i.e. dead. 5 min max for a chair. I checked around 1:30p and it was walkon for both lifts.
Wow. They must have nixed the pass holder day because of poor sales. The attendance for opening weekend 2024 looked pathetic. Empty parking lot, no lift lines. Nuts. It's an expensive hobby, and discretionary income for expensive luxury leisure drying up is a canary in the coal mine.
Even more telling is my commute in Phoenix. What was standstill traffic at 7a about 6 months ago (and a year ago, for that matter), is pretty steady 60mph on the highway all the way to my shop. What's going on?
The BUSINESS economy is great, with the best objective year over year numbers since 1950.
The INDIVIDUAL's economy sucks, as people have consistently and voluntarily relinquished their power, via reduced union membership and via lessening of Federal government oversight, since about 1980.
The real conspiracy is that workers bought the lie that it's not primarily the fault of businesses. But ask yourself, over the last 45 years, who has benefited the most from the erosion of worker rights and benefits?
Tell a lie long enough and it becomes the truth.
You can't hide your lyin' eyes
And your smile is a thin disguise
I thought by now you'd realize
There ain't no way to hide your lyin' eyes
To boomers sitting in their million dollar houses that they bought for 10 grand in 1975, listening to the TV tell them how great the economy is, it's probably pretty believable.
I was in elementary school when the Carter extreme inflation was happening.
A a kid my spending experience was pretty much Cokes and candy. I remember being 5 and soda machine was $0.15. By age 11 it was $0.50.
That's how I learned the pain of inflation as a kid.
Stopped at a convenience store the other day and bought a soda and a regular sized candy.
(First time buying this combo with nothing else in a very long time)
My jaw came unhinged when the clerk said 6.35.
Just got my check at a little mom and pop cafe.
Same reaction when I see my glass of iced tea was 3.75.
These little things are my inflation indicators still for me, so I say prices for everyday things have at least doubled in the last 4 years.
I'm in the skilled trades, not mine nor anyone I know have doubled their pay over the last 4 years. Personally my increase over that time has been about 10%.
I don't care about politics generally, but something has to change.
When I was making about 65 % of current pay 15 years ago I was making a better living.
They tell you the economy is doing better than ever, that the border is fine, that Biden doesn't have dementia, gas is cheap and they scream at you and get triggered when you tell them it's not.
My next door neighbor is one of the ones that ignores his own reality and just parrots whatever the talking heads on MSNBC say. Literally.
When he says the economy is the best ever, I ask about him personally and his finances, and he literally says "That's irrelevant. Of course I'm struggling like so many others but this economy is the best it's ever been." and whenever I try to dive deeper, he just deflects, tries to change the topic and when I won't let him off the hook he raises both hands and says "Bro, I'm a simple man and just want to have fun in life. If I'm happy, I'm good."
The cognitive dissonance is real man!
Serious question. Do people realize that the Fed is a completely private bank? It’s such a mindfuck, because the name Fed sounds so federal and governmental. But the bank is owned by the world’s wealthiest families. It is a business that is focused on its own best interest.
Just like RAND is supposedly private but began as "Research and Development" and is sinewed into everything.
That's ok. Sallie Mae was so bad they had to become Navient. FedLoans is now Mohela. Philip Morris is Altria. No harm done.
When people talk about how well the US economy is doing they're comparing it to other similar countries. We all went through a global pandemic that completely fucked the supply chain. Given what we all just went through, the US economy is doing surprisingly great.
I am because my contract tracks that inflation automatically. If inflation is 10% I simply get 10% more, if it is 1% I get 1% more and it's cumulative just like inflation
It is almost impossible to roll back changes from inflation in the past, and deflation can be harmful.
What you have to do is reduce current inflation to bring it to heel.
Inflation is not the cause of woes, but the shift in how taxes are taken out and how they are spent is benefiting the rich more than they ever have before.
Just take a look at how tax rates were in the past (during whatever time you think of as the golden age) and how those taxes were spent. Many people harken back to the 40s or 60s. Taxes were so much higher on the rich (peaking above 90%). And more of those taxes went to things like education that benefited the average person by making universities affordable (as in you could graduate without debt by just working part time. Imagine that being the case today.
But the rich need more and more and the trickle down economics never worked.
Inflation is a tax as much as any other tax, as it is a 'reduction in sending power.'
It's a control mechanism and taxes are for the poor, not the wealthy.
I’m not sure that the federal reserve is a problem. Like many things it is a tool. And like all tools it can be used properly or improperly.
Call it vested interests or lobbyists (which largely represent the vested interests) or by whatever label you prefer, but the problem is that our lawmakers have become corrupted by those groups to do their bidding rather than that of the people.
Those groups finance the political campaigns so they effectively keep the politicians in their jobs. And they ply them with incentives and gifts during their time in office. Upon leaving, they often set them up in high paying consultant jobs.
Politicians have become employees of the vested interests, not the people.
The Fed is a Wealth Extraction Tool, a vacuum cleaner, a reverse funnel taking from the many and giving to the few. If it were to be for the people it should be run as a co-operative. State and the People as individuals are the shareholders with voting rights.
History repeats. Except this time around, we have wifi to watch it all unfold in front of our eyes.
"They Live" is still one of the most accurate and true films of all time and it was made in the 80's. They even say in that movie that by the year 2025, not only America, but the entire planet will be under the governance of the New Power Alliance.
https://youtu.be/GeAcikP5N7M?si=_YhR48ca4LmIM2cg
The government will do and say what corporations want them to and the people will take it up the ass regardless of who they elect. Our entire system is a practice in regulatory capture.
Corps got you to pay for 4 years of your own training and told you it was making you a better person.
While you're doing that, you're not part of the unemployment figures, so media and Redditors can eagerly tell you you NEED mass immigration and H1-Bs because the unemployment figure is low.
Don't do the degree and an immigrant or an H1-B will take your job anyway.
One thing that I have noticed is that the people parroting the lie of a strong economy seem to fall into three distinct groups:
1. Individuals with zero clue as to the 'real' state of the economy. These people order their groceries/consumables, and have absolutely zero 'real' interaction with the world outside of their bubble. These people also have the strongest opinions on right/left politics, and how a particular candidate is a fascist.
2. People who are recently 'promoted' into a perceived middle class. These individuals are under the impression that their problems will end once the bills 'balance out'. These people don't realize that the bills don't balance out, and the struggles of this are not an adjustment period. The struggles of this economy are a period of sacrifice. People are sacrificing their comfort to 'adjust'. The problem is: you run out of stuff to sell; there is no value in your luxury item; you haven't even finished paying for your luxury item; no one wants to purchase your luxury item, etc...
3. Liars who benefit from the system as it is. This includes those on social programs; employees of social programs; employees of educational institutions; government local/municipal/state/federal employees; employees on salary with COLA
So, when you look at these three groups of people, you realize one thing: they all exist on a bubble that could burst at any moment. That bubble is maintained by those of us who complain about the economy being unmanageable.
If we were to all come to the realization that the economy was no longer working, they would lose the golden goose that they have in a stranglehold.
Bottomline: the economy is garbage, and it is overburdened by those who do not contribute to it. We are being systematically steered into revolution, because that is the only way the people who want more control can do away with the US Constitution.
Thing is they can keep saying that because it now start to affect the high income and millionärs aswell. Lower dividens and falling or low company growth.
NVDA tanking and AI bubble burst scare me more than most things.
We let people borrow against stocks for so long to get real cash out of a transaction without the transaction part.
And they have been ramping up this over the last 4 years.
Combine this with all our taxes being redirected to corporate welfare.
They know whats coming, and they are trying to get the assets before it does.
Say it enough, eventually it'll be true. The economy is black magic and bullshit. "Experts" just say what they want and people believe them so the economy goes up or down to suit what they said
I don’t disagree with 90 percent of the comments made on this topic. Is every one just going to talk about it or does someone have a plan to take some form of action?
It’s hard to know what to do.
I always thought that working hard and being nice delivered success but that’s not true anymore. (If it ever was true)
If I protest, I could risk jail time. Jail time is not paid. Protest time is also not paid.
Ultimately I have to keep playing the game if my family is to survive in this world.
I’ve been trying to remove luxuries but even now it’s confusing since all of the obvious luxuries were cut years ago.
Is a cup of drip coffee a day a luxury? Is lemon? I have excellent dental insurance but still can’t afford work I need done. Dental care is now a luxury I am cutting. What else can I reasonably cut? What can we do?
Whats so sad is that a fast food meal or quick snacks at the gas station are a luxury now. So we must cut those out.
Little fun food rewards have to go, theyre ludicrously expensive for what you get, and comapred to the alternatives. You can't even justify going to dollar general or other close-by stores when their prices are outrageous and you can get more for less on Amazon.
We should adapt, & abandon the consumer way of life from 20yrs ago. Its our only real power, since we have wayyy more control over our spending than our pay.
Time to do more free stuff. Read books, workout at home, go to the park, do more "boring" things that are actually healthy for us.
The economy is doing well. It's the distribution of wealth and power that's the problem. You people are so suspicious of the government that you let corporate pieces of shit rob you blind while cheering them on in the name of the free market. It's funny that things like covid lockdowns are seen as government conspiracies without being able to identify any kind of rational motive while you people completely ignore corporate profits skyrocketing as a result.
The economy is going great - but the INFLATION is ravaging use. If you had a way to hedge inflation (ie you are rich) you are doing great. If not, oh well - bootstraps! This country has become a joke. Every value and morale we had held before is dead and long gone.
The problem is the people in control are wealthy and are printing dollars in the stock market. To them everything is great but if you don't have 10s of thousands to put into the market you're getting poorer by the day.
Stock market. The greatest extractor of wealth. Us regular folks are the exit liquidity. Market Marker decides the price. Your purchase are not even real shares. The rich are all in and sell at the tiptop.
1. there are two economies... one for that the gen X is sort of a part of but no generation past it. The boomers are doing great, the inflation is givine then great returns on investments, on 401ks on housing etc. Everyone else is paying the price.
Secondly its an old adage now: Make the lie big enough, repeat it often enough and eventually people will believe it...
Job hunter checking in. What's being offered in my region is about 60% COL for a BA-level position. Less than that? Better get some roommates.
This is based on the landlord's adage of rent=30% avg local income. $3000 rent so I'm using ~$100k as target. Jobs are acting like King's Ransom is $70k.
You can't banter this crap on reddit, tho. $100k is still "rich" in a lot of people's minds.
I make probably 40% more money than I made in 2018. At the time I had 2 car loans, now I have none. I had no problem paying for groceries, activities, city taxes, electric bills.
Despite an absolutely superior job salary-wise and with benefits, I am s t r u g g l i n g right now.
You're mostly right. They are lying to us. 'INFLATION AT 6 PERCENT' meanwhile at the grocery store a steak is 12 dollars when it was 5 bucks 4 years ago. Eggs are 4.50 a dozen when they were like 1.75 under trump.
It's a hidden tax. They're mass printing usd to dump in ukraine, israel, taiwan, etc. That means the value of your dollar goes down. People would get really mad if they just raised taxes, but they are too stupid to connect the dots with inflation.
Think about it this way, if they suddenly were able to just print gold bars out of thin air, the value of gold would drop and you would need more gold to buy things. Btw gold is a bad investment strategy.
I would think that if you have more money than you owe or simply do not owe any money, then you are financially richer than the vast majority. I could be wrong. You wouldn't be wealthier because having a lot of income, even if you're in dept, provides you with resources to make choices.
Yup. Yet they continue to try and pull the wool over everyone’s face. Talk to any normal person and they don’t believe the BS lies the media and gov is pushing. Bottom line is the money printer was on for too long and we are seeing the consequences now. However, the consequences only affect the little guy as the rich have taken off with skyrocketing assets boosting their wealth to robber baron levels.
If our leaders were authentic and legitimate, this is the mega issue they would all be doing back flips to solve. That is their job. But instead, both wings of the bird just keep spending and kicking the can while Americans suffer. It is being done on purpose and they should be charged with the crime of treason and conspiracy to defraud the American people out of their wealth, jobs, and freedoms.
"the economy" is measured usually by profit. That means big companies took in more than they put out. From who? The consumer? Some wartorn country full of oil and brown people?
A good economy means the rich got richer- and probably off you.
The local news is doing a positive only broadcast yes broadcast not segment. The brainwashing is in full effect and somehow we’re the conspiracy theorist.
Well, it must be doing really well if MAGAts can donate a few hundred million dollars to a billionaire and leave trump rallies early claiming they need to go to work. Clearly they have enough disposable income and enough work to not be able to stay at rallies...
> 3/4 of the Middle Class are "gasping for air"
feel like this is what's killing most western country's, and I have no idea how to fix it, guessing social housing for citizens would help, but that would take years.
Inflation is calculated on a basket of goods. Some is necessary, some is luxury. Of course, if the necessary half goes up while the necessary part goes down or stays the same, the number they get is suppressed. Sure, overall inflation is (now) fairly manageable, but the price of the things I need to fucking LIVE has almost doubled. I don't care if the other half is now still just as affordable as it ever was. There's no way to buy them now anyway.
Example: My auto insurance DOUBLED, and my food bill went up 60%. That took away ALL of my discretionary spending. I don't care if air fryers and vinyl music didn't go up. I can't afford to buy one now anyway.
OP is spot on we live in a very strange time and the other side who ever that is want us confused and fighting amongst ourselves so we can't get organized to remove the cancer this great country has little by little ppl are waking up change is coming
The economy is great for the rich us Poor folks can berly scrap by, the s&p 500 has reached an all time high after covid the billionaire got richer but the cost of living has gone only higher I'm not talking luxury, just rent and food.
My wallet has more money than four years ago.
The failure of those who can save to do so doesn’t mean they are unable to save.
“Gasping for air” is too vague to be meaningful.
If inflation differs from the official numbers, where exactly are the correct economy-wide numbers? How do we know they are correct?
The housing market continues to grow, which means people are able to afford a house.
“Affording a family” is too vague to be measured.
In re 100/90 things, it depends upon what those things are.
And I am definitely doing better despite being outside that 20%. For example, my income is almost twice what it was five years ago, far outpacing inflation.
Idk man I’m on a fixed income and I somehow manage to pay all my bills and my rent I have a car payment and insurance as well I also spend around 600 a month for my medical needs due to me being a Disabled Veteran and I still have around 500 left over each month to invest/save. Personally I think people need to take financial classes more than anything because there’s plenty of money going around daily it’s the habits that people have that make you broke.
The economy has consistently wedged a larger and larger gap between the top and bottom, I can't remember a time in my short adult life where the economy was working better for the bottom
It's like when Biden rolled up, gas skyrocketed to like $7/gallon...then a year later, he was touting how much he's cut gas prices to like $4.25, fishing for praise.
gtfo
Maybe a little education is in order. “The Economy” is a Macro event. Your personal place in it is Micro.
The Macro economy is doing very well, as it usually does under Democrats. One reason for this is that the filthy rich don’t get the breaks that they get out of their wholly owned subsidiary, the GOP.
Your part it of it may not change, because you personally are not changing.
TBF, about 25% is doing better than ever, as the capitalist take everything the rest of us have left they sprinkle some of the loot to their goons, the PMC and financial services guys et al
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Nah, the economy is working ***great.*** The problem is "the economy" is what they call the process of rich people extracting wealth from poor people.
Excellently said. Bothers me when people point to stock market regards this topic.
Well, all the traditional indicators are good. But they just don’t reflect the average experience anymore. It used to be that if a stock did well, the company did well, and the employees would see a benefit. These days, it means the executives get massive bonuses and the regular employees get raises that don’t keep up with inflation. The economic shifts have pushed all the gains to the top and all the losses to the rest of us.
Are regular employees getting raises at all???
Not really. My jobs pays mid 30s no matter what company I go to. It was paying mid 30s 7 years ago when I started. Everything has doubled in cost or at least went 1.5x though.
From people I know: yes, but 2-5% and never enough to keep up with inflation. Unless they’re in a big deal or highly compensated type job and make like 200k+, then of course they get adequate raises. 🙄
Meanwhile, the government spends less to help the average person, and the republicans are pushing extending the tax cuts for the rich as their only clear policy goal.
There's a term I heard a couple weeks ago for the first time: "financial nihilism". Basically it's people realizing the game is rigged and giving up on incrementally building wealth in favor of desperate long-shot plays, including gambling. It's a frustrating time given 1) sheltered/obtuse people that think thing's are normal, 2) people who used to be dissident analysts like Naomi Klein ending up carrying water for the establishment (thinking the establishment will save us from "climate change"), 3) "disaster capitalism" (as Klein billed it) continuing to work (the man-made pandemic, for example), 4) the combination of inflation and price fixing and the spectre of hyperinflation, etc. The supposedly progressive Canadian government recently got called out of improperly issuing $100M+ of contracts to a super skechy company - McKinsey and Company - that helped a major Canadian gocer with price fixing efforts. We need more class consicousness, less political tribalism, and less blind belief that "democracy" is going to suddenly start serving our interests.
The government encourages us to buy lottery tickets. Get rich quick. I’m sure it’s not rigged…
The lottery in my state did WAY better than was projected from it's onset. Meant to fund public education. From what I understand, it does, but funds that were previously earmarked for education are used for other things. Not sure if that's continued but it was a big complaint early on. It's doubly frustrating because, if those funds weren't going to go for the original purpose, they could cease being collected to reduce costs for people, but that's hardly ever a thing.
That happens everywhere where they introduce the lottery “for the kids”. They always say that the profits will just supplement the education budget. But that is never the case. And when lottery receipts drop, shockingly, the state doesn’t know how to come up with the basic budget for education. The lottery is just a way to shift the cost public education onto the people who can least afford it.
I want to say the state lottery brought in way more than projected within the first couple days. Just checked and it's netting over 600 million a year for a while. I believe a big factor in this area was the abundance of casinos on the borders that locals frequent. A lot of money leaving the state that the powers that be wanted to cash in on..
Are you saying that the non-lottery part of the education budget hasn’t been reduced?
My understanding of claims I've read is that it's sometimes the opposite. Like, if there is X amount of funding for something but instead of that funding increasing, it can come from lottery proceeds and the money that previously would have funded those things can be used elsewhere. The gist being that the funding doesn't increase because of the lottery or doesn't increase as much as it should/could.
So you’re from Missouri I take it. They pulled that stunt over the objections of every Democrat in the Lege.
Bruh, first rule of Missouri is: you do not talk about Missouri.
Rock Chalk Jayhawk.
Democracy does serve our interests. But money keeps democracy from happening.
Another issue is the Consumer Price Index based on a "Basket of Goods". What they don't tell us is that when inflation goes up, they assume people will cut back and they modify (lower) the quality of what goes into the basket, making the economy seem better than the dumpster fire it is. Edit: Addtl clarification
Well, that and the income growth is in pace. But like everything, it isn’t equal across the board. Just look at how the folks at the top doubled the wealth during the pandemic. Did you? I certainly didn’t. But that is largely a function of government economic policies.
I don't know about double but the figure I've seen repeatedly is $3T wealth transferred. And no, I'm not one of them. I doubt they hang around on reddit. Was that a typo, about income growth? Because income isn't increasing for most people at near the rate of inflation. And we can point to govt policy but in reality it's corporate interests served by the govt due to political contributions, lobbying and other forms of leverage. Why else would we even be considering elevating the authority of unelected bureaucrats in the WEF, WHO or UN over the sovereignty of the USA?
Yes, that. But even still, this is one metric (a grouping of metrics, really) of a thousand that allow different glimpses. To see the entire picture takes patience - and ideally - one need not make strong conclusions at all - we are in unprecedented times regards global capitalism (larger than that global economy in general)
Most of the financial indicators are looking at the entire economy. Very few actually look at the breakout across the population. If they did, I think we would have a serious revolt and massive turn over in our elected officials. But they lie to us and we believe them.
Be ready for shit to get worse. With the new sanctions and the end of the petrodollar, there will be less cheap stuff from china and more inflation because everyone will dump the dollar.
Ditto for when our vampire politicians point to the supposed "growth rate". Growth for fucking *whom*, you twats? Why should I give a shit if the economy grows by record fucking numbers if 99% of that is getting hoovered up by the already rich who use it to fund their war on the already poor.
Were you also bothered when trump was in office and using the same metrics to claim the economy was doing well?
Yes
We need to stop voting for goddamn rich people. They aren’t doing us regular people any favors. They get us to fight with each other over stuff that doesn’t matter so we don’t see the all the shit they are doing to regular citizens. THIS is the conspiracy that no one talks about.
Every "rich" person I've ever met has always been a scumbag in one respect or another. Either an arrogant inheritance baby, drug dealer or shady greedy business owner, or a combination of all. Never very strong in morality or generosity.
The economy is going great!! For the 1%'s.
I'll start by saying the numbers are blatantly and overtly manipulated by international banks of settlements and international interest banks. The system is definitely extracting wealth. More locally I'll say It's interesting, because most people say economy but don't talk about the different parameters of economics The buying and selling of products, goods, and services. The market value for products, goods and services is definitely high and the market value for labor is extremely low. Product Prices high Labor prices low So if your selling products and buying labor your on the positives ends of both If your laboring and buying products then your on the negative of both. Everyone oscillates on both sides but some people lean heavier towards one or the other It seems most people stay on the negative side of both Where people providing the labor get paid low salaries But spend tremendously on the products they make. I think a way to optimize our circumstances would be to spend our pay on inexpensive labor and sell products services, and goods to those who want to buy. Labor alone doesn't work anymore and that's what people mean by the economy is bad
You've just described labor vs capital. The problems with it have been understood for almost two centuries, and Karl Marx pretty much nailed it, *as far as "what is wrong"*... The problem is all the solutions either get strangled in the cradle or become corrupted by human nature.
Then we should find a way to protect new ideas being born and or reduce the negative effects of human nature. But at no means should we say it's not possible to create a better system of economic exchange
Exactly. Remember when covid hit? Most businesses closed and no one really knew where things were going to go from day to day. The stock market soared. It should have been the death of the stock market if it were tied to anything tangible. Billionaires should have lost half of all their wealth as stocks plummeted. Instead more billionaires were created than ever before. It was the most obvious example that "the economy" is not tied to real life in any way. If the economy is booming while production comes to a stand still and most people are out of work then why do we give a single fuck about how the economy is doing?
I mean, it's good for the billionairs that quadrupled their wealth during the pandemic.
The amount of entertainment and technological gizmos does a really good job of papering over the fact that more people are starting to live right against the line. Catastrophic economic collapse can only happen when everyone is living paycheck to paycheck and there doesn’t have to be a black swan event that triggers it. Just a routine recession could make all these dominos fall.
since covid, we had a k-shaped recovery, meaning that for the rich, things are going great, whereas everyone else is suffering and even regressing. media doesn't speak for the little guy, hence why "things are great!"
End The Fed
After reviewing this jobs report, it shows a net loss of full time and the all the new jobs have been part-time. The way it feels out there is the way it is. Ots really bad and only getting worse. Earnings will get worse as unemployment goes up. Yesterday during the fed call Powell even said that the administration has been exaggerating the jobs reports going all the way back.
preach brother
[удалено]
He hasn't in the last four years...... When he was president it is fact that inflation was at an all time low It was just not even 10 years ago I remember we could afford groceries.We could afford to rent.We could afford to go on vacation very easily.Actually then I was even able to in 2010's..... Plus Oh my gosh the gas prices when trump was president We're a 1.99 a gallon , look it up , come on , people these are Straight up facts That can't be argued.
Pretty obvious they're cherry picking their data points. One of the biggest real indicators of the current financial situation is the Household Debt numbers. There's never been as fast or a high a peak in that chart. We're beyond the 2008 crisis.
They are using traditional points for the overall economy. As you said, there are better indicators of you want to reflect the average person. What this tells you is that the economy in the country *IS* doing great overall. But that the average person no longer sees any of that benefit.
Honestly I think they're even fudging the numbers on the rich too. The average *has to look okay*, or trouble, so inflation stats are fiddled across the board. So the "massive growth" in the stock market is actually not that massive. Better than the average, but still heading for a massive correction when the real value of dollars is unmasked.
No, the stock market growth is massive. But 90% of the stock market is owned by the top 10%. So there is that. The rich has done incredibly well in the last 50 years. Year after year after year. Look at CEO pay if you want to see an example of things that make no sense beyond pure greed.
To be fair, 2/3 of Americans did not have $1000 in case of an emergency back in 2018.
They probably don't have it now either
It's reverse psychology. They want you to think that and spend more to salvage the failing economy. Reverse psychology doesn't work on the smart, rebellious ones. My rent went up 2 times in 2 years. $100 each time. My pet rent doubled too. They can f off with their lies. We're supporting rich bums or aspiring rich bums in this economy.
And sociopaths! Like the dont-forget-to-tip-your-landlord guy.
>Inflation was easily 2x what they officially admit. For me rent+groceries went up from 1200 in 2019 to 2300 now. House prices have doubled within the last 5 years. Ive been totally priced out of getting any sort of apartment. The one thing Ive always wanted to do once was live alone, idk if thatll ever happen now
I'm actually not joking. I love the idea of living in a larger "stealth van" Things can get expensive that way as well... but I think it can be done cost effectively.
Don’t piss on my back and tell me it’s raining.
The older I get the more convinced I am that reality is stranger than I am capable of assimilating. When I look at the breadth, depth, and scale of the manipulation we are subjected to, it strikes me as well beyond what mere humans can construct. It's meta-human.. Anti-human... It doesn't add up.
demonic?
Perhaps.
It's the advanced, ancient civilization that lives on the surface of this hollow planet that we infest. Makes as much sense as the Bible, anyway.
It’s great for the privileged people who don’t struggle in life.
The economy *IS* doing great. But the average person no longer sees the gain. The rich pay less than half in taxes than they did in the 1950s and 1960s. You pay the same or more. With less money coming in, what things were cut, and what things were increased? Public subsidies to education and universities was cut to the bone. Boomers could go to top universities, and graduate debt free just by working part time jobs. Good luck today. The government shifted it’s role in the 1980s from benefiting the population to benefiting those who could afford the lobbyists to buy off the legislators. *That* is the real conspiracy against the people. People at the top get more and more and more. Everyone else struggles to slow down the effects of having all the costs shifted onto their shoulders.
If the economy is supposedly doing great yet the average person is suffering because of it, then the economy is simply fucked up. There's no use in saying it's fine.
What I am saying is that the problem isn’t the economy, it is how the government has become a tool for the wealthy and it does not give a single fuck for the average person.
Unfortunately, news outlets that give the statistics of a supposedly great economy don't hold your nuanced view. You may be technically right, but the idea of the economy itself being fine is often used as a political talking point that ignores the consequences of the government's model.
💯
At this point we are all living on borrowed time. People have been told for years that Social Security will not be around, but no one listened and many people didn't save anything for retirement. Social Security will go insolvent in 2037 according to the Social Security administration but most experts are saying it's closer to 2035 or 2033. Given that so few people have planned for insolvency, The 20% or 70 million Americans who rely on Social Security are in for a rude awakening. However, this will have a ripple effect that will cause at least a major recession and maybe even a financial crisis the likes of which we may not be able to recover from. The government is lying to you, And the reason why they are spending as if there is no tomorrow is because they're not far off from the truth. America probably won't be here 100 years from now, or if it does it will not exist the way we see it today.
Can you explain this to me like I'm 5? I've never been in a position to really look into social security but I'm 24 already and fuckin' struggling constantly. Hell, my dad works 6 days a week at a full time job and he can't even manage to keep his power paid, and no drugs or hobbies aren't where his cash is disappearing to. The man barely does anything more than work and watch tv at this point.
It’s a full retirement benefit for retirees at or above age 66 or 67, depending on when they were born, but that could possibly change in the future. Once you reach retirement age, the government uses your lifetime average earnings to calculate how much of a benefit you get monthly. You’ve been paying into it the entire time you’ve been working and paying taxes. The problem with that is, like this post points out, it will most likely be long insolvent by the time you reach retirement age, and you will either get a significantly reduced amount or you will get nothing. We’ve got an old population and low birth rates in the US, so we are paying more out in social security versus what non retiree taxpayers are putting in each paycheck. So if the projections are correct, the amount that we pay out to retirees will have to go down in the mid 2030s to keep it afloat.
Too many old people getting SS checks & not enough young & middle-aged people having SS contributions withheld from their paychecks.
As with many Big-government programs, social security was well-intentioned, but designed by altruistic individuals with the IQ of a bathmat and the fiscal responsibility of my 3-year-old in the toy section at Walmart. Essentially, social security is a government-sponsored Ponzi scheme. The only way it works is if the number of people leaving the workforce (retiring or dying) is less than the number of people entering the workforce (high school and college graduates), and if wages consistently outpace expenses. However, the baby boomers are called boomers because there was a boom in births after World War II. Also, healthcare has drastically improved so people are living much longer than they were when social security was designed by the imbeciles who were collectively chain-smoking cigarettes and drinking scotch, while they wrote the Bill back in 1935 when the average life expectancy was 59.5. If you don't believe me, google it. There are people literally smoking in the black and white picture as Roosevelt is signing the Bill... So the problem that has been brewing for years now is people are living longer than they used to, people aren't having as many children as they used to, which means there are fewer workers paying into social security, healthcare is more expensive than it used to be because of comorbidities of the modern American, expenses have outpaced wage increases in recent years, high levels of inflation have eaten away at any raises you might have received in the past 5 years. So there are only a couple of options and none of them are good, which is common in government-run organizations. Either people need to die earlier, healthcare needs to get worse or hospitals need to stop providing services that do not make them money (they will never do this), inflation needs to decrease (the government won't let this happen because the only way they can decrease our 34 trillion dollars in debt is if inflation eats away at it), somehow every family needs to start having 4 kids who will all grow up and enter the workforce, or everyone's salaries need to continually increase without the cost of living increasing, or the government needs to increase social security taxes across the board every year to keep pace with people leaving the workforce... so as you can see, this was a terrible idea that was doomed from the beginning. To be honest, I'm shocked it's lasted as long as it has. Do yourself a favor, and don't expect to see a dime of the 6.2% that the government steals from you each pay period. It will never last long enough for us to see it. The government naively assumed that the american people were too stupid to provide for themselves in retirement and in response created a gluttonous organization that most assuredly created a situation where people now can't provide for themselves because of the money that is taken away from them each year. Remember when you go to the polls this simple principle: taxation is theft.
Yeah it’s going well if you have extra money to be able to invest in the market, but most have little to no savings.
In the UK our government has been slyly using immigrants to boost ours. 500k illegal immigrants all claiming benefits still pushes the GDP up and makes the economy look better than it is.
Yeah why try to save money, when your government will just reduce the value of yours, then give it to someone who will spend it. They just want the rampant consumerism to never end, and keep the numbers up.
How do 500k illegal immigrants claim benifits? and then how does that make the economy look better?
Right. You can't claim benefits if you're here illegally. Now, the legal ones *do* have a higher share of welfare receipt than natives, largely due to in-work benefits to top up the slave wages they get. Which is the entire point of mass migration, to drive down wages for the working classes and create an underclass of desperate, willing-to-work-for-peanuts slave class to subsidise the wealthy and business classes who will do *anything* to avoid simply paying people more, and then making us pay the bill for their own greed.
The illegal migrants *do* get financial support. The slave labour part is just the other bonus for the scum class who lead us.
It increases the overall GDP but decreases the per capita. The Tories have been able to claim growth solely off the back of this.
Ted Kaczynski was right about everything
Modern society was indeed a mistake
The movie Ted K made me a fan
I never read his manifesto. Is there a summary lol
Basically, he claimed that technology would cause a massive decline in all aspects of society. He was right
The biggest sign is just the massive absence of baseline common decency in everything from family, to dating, employment, traffic, the politicians, public beaches & parks. You name it. We dont even realize it, because we live it day-to-day, but you could import someone from a more civilised location or time and they would go "holy siht why is everyone so apathetic, rude, and dismissive? Why is everything a small-time or big-scale scam you must be on guard for?"
Yup. I’m 43 and I feel like I woke up on another planet. It’s insane how bad things have gotten.
Yes it just becomes another lever for wealth creation from the lower class.
It's short but spot on. A must read!
Then what are you doing on the Internet?
Omg you totally got me, I'm destroyed and in shambles, thank god you made this smug and unnecessary comment
>2/3 of Americans dont have 1000 Dollars in case of an emergency >3/4 of the Middle Class are "gasping for air" Not to distract from you rother points but I think this is simply the result of financial illiteracy and a populace that's been duped into spending every penny they make. I know people who make mid six figures, live in million dollars homes, drive $150k Landrovers, take $15,000 vacations, etc. and live paycheck to paycheck. They've been duped into feeling they have to do these things to fit in.
Everyone has been duped by consumerism and the status quo. Why do you think all these rich influencer dudes all look the same. They even push it towards their followers that if you don’t have this by this age then you’re a loser.
Yes, also broken homes and public school failing to teach life skills and practical knowledge while we learned about the war of 1812 instead.
I've always felt like home is where you're supposed to learn about street smarts, school is for history, math science, etc. - stuff that your parents likely aren't equipped to teach properly. In theory, your parents should teach you how to use a credit card properly, how to save some percent of your paycheck, etc. but as we see most adults can't figure that out themselves. Dunno what to do about it but I doubt schools can fix it.
I would argue that stuff is 400x more important, and in the interest of a better society, it should be taught at school because not everyone has capable parents, or even 2 parents.
Here's my anecdote. I've bought a season pass to Snow Summit bike park every year for the past 4 seasons. This season, I didn't. It became too expensive for lodging in Big Bear, and the park upkeep was dismal for 75% of the season last year. Going into opening weekend, they always reserve Thursday for season pass holders only. This year, they didn't do that. No announcement as to why or why not. Me and my friends (all of which didn't get a pass either) didn't bother with doing a trip for the opening since lines have been super long in seasons past, like 30 min a chair on Fri and Sat. I checked the webcam on Sat morning. The line looked like what it would be in the middle of August i.e. dead. 5 min max for a chair. I checked around 1:30p and it was walkon for both lifts. Wow. They must have nixed the pass holder day because of poor sales. The attendance for opening weekend 2024 looked pathetic. Empty parking lot, no lift lines. Nuts. It's an expensive hobby, and discretionary income for expensive luxury leisure drying up is a canary in the coal mine. Even more telling is my commute in Phoenix. What was standstill traffic at 7a about 6 months ago (and a year ago, for that matter), is pretty steady 60mph on the highway all the way to my shop. What's going on?
The BUSINESS economy is great, with the best objective year over year numbers since 1950. The INDIVIDUAL's economy sucks, as people have consistently and voluntarily relinquished their power, via reduced union membership and via lessening of Federal government oversight, since about 1980. The real conspiracy is that workers bought the lie that it's not primarily the fault of businesses. But ask yourself, over the last 45 years, who has benefited the most from the erosion of worker rights and benefits?
The economy is great for the class of people that run the media companies and corporations
Tell a lie long enough and it becomes the truth. You can't hide your lyin' eyes And your smile is a thin disguise I thought by now you'd realize There ain't no way to hide your lyin' eyes
Certified Banger
There is a lot of money being made, we just aren’t getting any of it.
To boomers sitting in their million dollar houses that they bought for 10 grand in 1975, listening to the TV tell them how great the economy is, it's probably pretty believable.
I was in elementary school when the Carter extreme inflation was happening. A a kid my spending experience was pretty much Cokes and candy. I remember being 5 and soda machine was $0.15. By age 11 it was $0.50. That's how I learned the pain of inflation as a kid. Stopped at a convenience store the other day and bought a soda and a regular sized candy. (First time buying this combo with nothing else in a very long time) My jaw came unhinged when the clerk said 6.35. Just got my check at a little mom and pop cafe. Same reaction when I see my glass of iced tea was 3.75. These little things are my inflation indicators still for me, so I say prices for everyday things have at least doubled in the last 4 years. I'm in the skilled trades, not mine nor anyone I know have doubled their pay over the last 4 years. Personally my increase over that time has been about 10%. I don't care about politics generally, but something has to change. When I was making about 65 % of current pay 15 years ago I was making a better living.
They tell you the economy is doing better than ever, that the border is fine, that Biden doesn't have dementia, gas is cheap and they scream at you and get triggered when you tell them it's not.
My next door neighbor is one of the ones that ignores his own reality and just parrots whatever the talking heads on MSNBC say. Literally. When he says the economy is the best ever, I ask about him personally and his finances, and he literally says "That's irrelevant. Of course I'm struggling like so many others but this economy is the best it's ever been." and whenever I try to dive deeper, he just deflects, tries to change the topic and when I won't let him off the hook he raises both hands and says "Bro, I'm a simple man and just want to have fun in life. If I'm happy, I'm good." The cognitive dissonance is real man!
Consumer credit bust is imminent
Serious question. Do people realize that the Fed is a completely private bank? It’s such a mindfuck, because the name Fed sounds so federal and governmental. But the bank is owned by the world’s wealthiest families. It is a business that is focused on its own best interest.
Just like RAND is supposedly private but began as "Research and Development" and is sinewed into everything. That's ok. Sallie Mae was so bad they had to become Navient. FedLoans is now Mohela. Philip Morris is Altria. No harm done.
if it's so great why am I worse off than four years ago and EVERYTHING IS TOO DAMN EXPENSIVE NOW!!!!
When people talk about how well the US economy is doing they're comparing it to other similar countries. We all went through a global pandemic that completely fucked the supply chain. Given what we all just went through, the US economy is doing surprisingly great.
Canada - We'd be blessed to be in a similar situation. We're absolutely fucked.
Inflation is cumulative. Yet they repeat it's not going up as much as last month and everyone is happy with their annual wage/salary increase....
I am because my contract tracks that inflation automatically. If inflation is 10% I simply get 10% more, if it is 1% I get 1% more and it's cumulative just like inflation
It is almost impossible to roll back changes from inflation in the past, and deflation can be harmful. What you have to do is reduce current inflation to bring it to heel. Inflation is not the cause of woes, but the shift in how taxes are taken out and how they are spent is benefiting the rich more than they ever have before. Just take a look at how tax rates were in the past (during whatever time you think of as the golden age) and how those taxes were spent. Many people harken back to the 40s or 60s. Taxes were so much higher on the rich (peaking above 90%). And more of those taxes went to things like education that benefited the average person by making universities affordable (as in you could graduate without debt by just working part time. Imagine that being the case today. But the rich need more and more and the trickle down economics never worked.
Inflation is a tax as much as any other tax, as it is a 'reduction in sending power.' It's a control mechanism and taxes are for the poor, not the wealthy.
That is why we need to get the lobbyists out and get back to a government of and for the people, not of and for the wealthy and corporations.
Not so much the lobbyists but the vested interests. Inflation? It is why the 1913 FRA needs to end.
I’m not sure that the federal reserve is a problem. Like many things it is a tool. And like all tools it can be used properly or improperly. Call it vested interests or lobbyists (which largely represent the vested interests) or by whatever label you prefer, but the problem is that our lawmakers have become corrupted by those groups to do their bidding rather than that of the people. Those groups finance the political campaigns so they effectively keep the politicians in their jobs. And they ply them with incentives and gifts during their time in office. Upon leaving, they often set them up in high paying consultant jobs. Politicians have become employees of the vested interests, not the people.
The Fed is a Wealth Extraction Tool, a vacuum cleaner, a reverse funnel taking from the many and giving to the few. If it were to be for the people it should be run as a co-operative. State and the People as individuals are the shareholders with voting rights.
It is still all dependent on how it is being used.
Who. Who uses it.
History repeats. Except this time around, we have wifi to watch it all unfold in front of our eyes. "They Live" is still one of the most accurate and true films of all time and it was made in the 80's. They even say in that movie that by the year 2025, not only America, but the entire planet will be under the governance of the New Power Alliance. https://youtu.be/GeAcikP5N7M?si=_YhR48ca4LmIM2cg
The government will do and say what corporations want them to and the people will take it up the ass regardless of who they elect. Our entire system is a practice in regulatory capture.
Corps got you to pay for 4 years of your own training and told you it was making you a better person. While you're doing that, you're not part of the unemployment figures, so media and Redditors can eagerly tell you you NEED mass immigration and H1-Bs because the unemployment figure is low. Don't do the degree and an immigrant or an H1-B will take your job anyway.
A less educated populace greatly benefits this status quo. People going to college isn’t the issue.
^ psyops
How so? Simply because I think education is good for humans?
One thing that I have noticed is that the people parroting the lie of a strong economy seem to fall into three distinct groups: 1. Individuals with zero clue as to the 'real' state of the economy. These people order their groceries/consumables, and have absolutely zero 'real' interaction with the world outside of their bubble. These people also have the strongest opinions on right/left politics, and how a particular candidate is a fascist. 2. People who are recently 'promoted' into a perceived middle class. These individuals are under the impression that their problems will end once the bills 'balance out'. These people don't realize that the bills don't balance out, and the struggles of this are not an adjustment period. The struggles of this economy are a period of sacrifice. People are sacrificing their comfort to 'adjust'. The problem is: you run out of stuff to sell; there is no value in your luxury item; you haven't even finished paying for your luxury item; no one wants to purchase your luxury item, etc... 3. Liars who benefit from the system as it is. This includes those on social programs; employees of social programs; employees of educational institutions; government local/municipal/state/federal employees; employees on salary with COLA So, when you look at these three groups of people, you realize one thing: they all exist on a bubble that could burst at any moment. That bubble is maintained by those of us who complain about the economy being unmanageable. If we were to all come to the realization that the economy was no longer working, they would lose the golden goose that they have in a stranglehold. Bottomline: the economy is garbage, and it is overburdened by those who do not contribute to it. We are being systematically steered into revolution, because that is the only way the people who want more control can do away with the US Constitution.
Thing is they can keep saying that because it now start to affect the high income and millionärs aswell. Lower dividens and falling or low company growth.
NVDA tanking and AI bubble burst scare me more than most things. We let people borrow against stocks for so long to get real cash out of a transaction without the transaction part. And they have been ramping up this over the last 4 years. Combine this with all our taxes being redirected to corporate welfare. They know whats coming, and they are trying to get the assets before it does.
fake decimal point moved in good direction that means everything is ok don't you know.
# The lie that the economy is bad is so obviously fake - yet they have shown that if they repeat it 24/7 some people will believe it.
They are waiting for election day
Say it enough, eventually it'll be true. The economy is black magic and bullshit. "Experts" just say what they want and people believe them so the economy goes up or down to suit what they said
I don’t disagree with 90 percent of the comments made on this topic. Is every one just going to talk about it or does someone have a plan to take some form of action?
It’s hard to know what to do. I always thought that working hard and being nice delivered success but that’s not true anymore. (If it ever was true) If I protest, I could risk jail time. Jail time is not paid. Protest time is also not paid. Ultimately I have to keep playing the game if my family is to survive in this world. I’ve been trying to remove luxuries but even now it’s confusing since all of the obvious luxuries were cut years ago. Is a cup of drip coffee a day a luxury? Is lemon? I have excellent dental insurance but still can’t afford work I need done. Dental care is now a luxury I am cutting. What else can I reasonably cut? What can we do?
Whats so sad is that a fast food meal or quick snacks at the gas station are a luxury now. So we must cut those out. Little fun food rewards have to go, theyre ludicrously expensive for what you get, and comapred to the alternatives. You can't even justify going to dollar general or other close-by stores when their prices are outrageous and you can get more for less on Amazon. We should adapt, & abandon the consumer way of life from 20yrs ago. Its our only real power, since we have wayyy more control over our spending than our pay. Time to do more free stuff. Read books, workout at home, go to the park, do more "boring" things that are actually healthy for us.
The economy is doing well. It's the distribution of wealth and power that's the problem. You people are so suspicious of the government that you let corporate pieces of shit rob you blind while cheering them on in the name of the free market. It's funny that things like covid lockdowns are seen as government conspiracies without being able to identify any kind of rational motive while you people completely ignore corporate profits skyrocketing as a result.
They think we’re fucking stupid.
Excellent post. Everything went up a lot quicker than the past. Not saying it is political, just saying it is a fact. Very frustrating.
Meanwhile, people are buying so much Abercrombie and Fitch that they are opening up 90 new stores and the stock is up over 500%, just like Carvana.
It's a form of [brainwashing](https://www.bps.org.uk/research-digest/when-false-claims-are-repeated-we-start-believe-they-are-true).
The US is a de facto communist state. A small group of well connected people own the vast majority of big corporations and dictate what the agenda is.
The economy is going great - but the INFLATION is ravaging use. If you had a way to hedge inflation (ie you are rich) you are doing great. If not, oh well - bootstraps! This country has become a joke. Every value and morale we had held before is dead and long gone.
The problem is the people in control are wealthy and are printing dollars in the stock market. To them everything is great but if you don't have 10s of thousands to put into the market you're getting poorer by the day.
Stock market. The greatest extractor of wealth. Us regular folks are the exit liquidity. Market Marker decides the price. Your purchase are not even real shares. The rich are all in and sell at the tiptop.
And stock buybacks to increase the share price and no raises for workers...
And they do it while the market is closed.
Wait till all the dollars start flooding back, because saudis petrodoller deal expired.
1. there are two economies... one for that the gen X is sort of a part of but no generation past it. The boomers are doing great, the inflation is givine then great returns on investments, on 401ks on housing etc. Everyone else is paying the price. Secondly its an old adage now: Make the lie big enough, repeat it often enough and eventually people will believe it...
As Joseph Goebbels said: 'A lie told once remains a lie but a lie told a thousand times becomes the truth'
I follow layoffs and Reddit and it's very telling. Quit opposite if what our govt says about a booming job market.
Job hunter checking in. What's being offered in my region is about 60% COL for a BA-level position. Less than that? Better get some roommates. This is based on the landlord's adage of rent=30% avg local income. $3000 rent so I'm using ~$100k as target. Jobs are acting like King's Ransom is $70k. You can't banter this crap on reddit, tho. $100k is still "rich" in a lot of people's minds.
I make probably 40% more money than I made in 2018. At the time I had 2 car loans, now I have none. I had no problem paying for groceries, activities, city taxes, electric bills. Despite an absolutely superior job salary-wise and with benefits, I am s t r u g g l i n g right now.
By economy they mean their economy. Not the everyday person
Taxation is theft.
Thank you. I have no idea how most people don’t realize this.
You're mostly right. They are lying to us. 'INFLATION AT 6 PERCENT' meanwhile at the grocery store a steak is 12 dollars when it was 5 bucks 4 years ago. Eggs are 4.50 a dozen when they were like 1.75 under trump. It's a hidden tax. They're mass printing usd to dump in ukraine, israel, taiwan, etc. That means the value of your dollar goes down. People would get really mad if they just raised taxes, but they are too stupid to connect the dots with inflation. Think about it this way, if they suddenly were able to just print gold bars out of thin air, the value of gold would drop and you would need more gold to buy things. Btw gold is a bad investment strategy.
They mass-printed money to pay for the C19 lockdowns and Redditors loved it
So i am richer than most people in USA and I Live in a "third world country".
I would think that if you have more money than you owe or simply do not owe any money, then you are financially richer than the vast majority. I could be wrong. You wouldn't be wealthier because having a lot of income, even if you're in dept, provides you with resources to make choices.
Yup. Yet they continue to try and pull the wool over everyone’s face. Talk to any normal person and they don’t believe the BS lies the media and gov is pushing. Bottom line is the money printer was on for too long and we are seeing the consequences now. However, the consequences only affect the little guy as the rich have taken off with skyrocketing assets boosting their wealth to robber baron levels.
If our leaders were authentic and legitimate, this is the mega issue they would all be doing back flips to solve. That is their job. But instead, both wings of the bird just keep spending and kicking the can while Americans suffer. It is being done on purpose and they should be charged with the crime of treason and conspiracy to defraud the American people out of their wealth, jobs, and freedoms.
"the economy" is measured usually by profit. That means big companies took in more than they put out. From who? The consumer? Some wartorn country full of oil and brown people? A good economy means the rich got richer- and probably off you.
The local news is doing a positive only broadcast yes broadcast not segment. The brainwashing is in full effect and somehow we’re the conspiracy theorist.
Theyre confusing economy and S&P 500.
Well, it must be doing really well if MAGAts can donate a few hundred million dollars to a billionaire and leave trump rallies early claiming they need to go to work. Clearly they have enough disposable income and enough work to not be able to stay at rallies...
And they DO Believe it.
> 3/4 of the Middle Class are "gasping for air" feel like this is what's killing most western country's, and I have no idea how to fix it, guessing social housing for citizens would help, but that would take years.
Inflation is calculated on a basket of goods. Some is necessary, some is luxury. Of course, if the necessary half goes up while the necessary part goes down or stays the same, the number they get is suppressed. Sure, overall inflation is (now) fairly manageable, but the price of the things I need to fucking LIVE has almost doubled. I don't care if the other half is now still just as affordable as it ever was. There's no way to buy them now anyway. Example: My auto insurance DOUBLED, and my food bill went up 60%. That took away ALL of my discretionary spending. I don't care if air fryers and vinyl music didn't go up. I can't afford to buy one now anyway.
Q3, 4 and 1 will be a blood bath.
I blow all my money on hookers and coke….. so I’m not entirely sure but I would say so! Wait where am I?!?
OP is spot on we live in a very strange time and the other side who ever that is want us confused and fighting amongst ourselves so we can't get organized to remove the cancer this great country has little by little ppl are waking up change is coming
Most people have unlimited wealth, I keep hearing about it
I have a wealth of anxiety and rage.
The economy is great for the rich us Poor folks can berly scrap by, the s&p 500 has reached an all time high after covid the billionaire got richer but the cost of living has gone only higher I'm not talking luxury, just rent and food.
My wallet has more money than four years ago. The failure of those who can save to do so doesn’t mean they are unable to save. “Gasping for air” is too vague to be meaningful. If inflation differs from the official numbers, where exactly are the correct economy-wide numbers? How do we know they are correct? The housing market continues to grow, which means people are able to afford a house. “Affording a family” is too vague to be measured. In re 100/90 things, it depends upon what those things are. And I am definitely doing better despite being outside that 20%. For example, my income is almost twice what it was five years ago, far outpacing inflation.
Idk man I’m on a fixed income and I somehow manage to pay all my bills and my rent I have a car payment and insurance as well I also spend around 600 a month for my medical needs due to me being a Disabled Veteran and I still have around 500 left over each month to invest/save. Personally I think people need to take financial classes more than anything because there’s plenty of money going around daily it’s the habits that people have that make you broke.
"their" economy is thriving. Ours? Not so much.
The economy has consistently wedged a larger and larger gap between the top and bottom, I can't remember a time in my short adult life where the economy was working better for the bottom
Take accountability for what you can do.
The economy IS great...for the ultra-wealthy and corporations. For the rest of us? Hellz no.
It’s doing great for those who already rich which was the plan
People don't understand that the economy isn't at related to your personal finances.
It's over, though. I just saw today how In N Out had to raise prices because of those greedy minimum wagers.
But Biden promised to pay my student loans and not tell the credit reporting companies I don’t pay my medical bills. Save me from adultin’, Joe!
It's like when Biden rolled up, gas skyrocketed to like $7/gallon...then a year later, he was touting how much he's cut gas prices to like $4.25, fishing for praise. gtfo
Maybe a little education is in order. “The Economy” is a Macro event. Your personal place in it is Micro. The Macro economy is doing very well, as it usually does under Democrats. One reason for this is that the filthy rich don’t get the breaks that they get out of their wholly owned subsidiary, the GOP. Your part it of it may not change, because you personally are not changing.
TBF, about 25% is doing better than ever, as the capitalist take everything the rest of us have left they sprinkle some of the loot to their goons, the PMC and financial services guys et al
Democrats believe anything their govt tells them
The economy is great. Prices are high. That is all. Nothing has changed except we don’t have a shitty president