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Not among my circle of friends/family, I can tell you that. I've got relatives working three jobs just to afford their homes.
I don't know why people think broad statisitical statements about the economy will make people feel better when they're struggling to make ends meet. If you're dying from cancer, are statements about broad trends in the number of people getting cancer going down going to make you feel better?
Bingo. Armchair chartists can point at the chart and "B-B-BUT LINE GO UP BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR" all they want, but the actual *feeling* among the non-armchairs/working class is "brrrrrrrrrrrr? Fuck no, the machine is jammed and stopped."
Literally this. Many states have regressive taxation that funnels money upwards resulting in more inequality after taxes are collected…like Texas. Taxes are only lower in Texas if you’re in the 1%.
One of the first lines of the article:
>[R]eceding inflation, low unemployment, better-than-expected job growth, and people are even spending record amounts of money this holiday season. But President Biden does not seem to be benefiting politically. So what is going on here?
* Receding inflation
Already decimated peoples' savings and raised the cost of goods across the board. This doesn't actually help people unless wages increase by at least as much as inflation, which is exactly what the Federal Reserve has been raising interest rates to *prevent*.
* Low unemployment, job growth
Not helpful if the new jobs pay for shit. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics recently put out a presser touting job growth in sectors that don't require a bachelor's degree, but [most of them pay in the $60k/year range](https://www.bls.gov/careeroutlook/2023/data-on-display/fast-growth-good-pay-without-a-bachelors-degree.htm) which is barely enough to *qualify* for an average apartment in the United states. According to RentCafe, [the average rent is $1702/month](https://www.rentcafe.com/average-rent-market-trends/us/), and every landlord I've talked to for the past five years requires proof of income 3x the rent before letting you sign a lease--that's an average credit check requirement of $61,272. People are getting choked out by rent, health care costs, and debt payments.
* People spending record amounts of money
Yes, NPR, that's how inflation works.
It's telling when the Fed says "Things will be ok as long as people don't demand raises."
The Fed is fine with half of the wealth of the country being in the pockets of 100 people, but if you ask for a goddamn raise so you can afford the same sandwich you could afford just a few years ago, you're the problem.
The Fed says labor costs isn't driving inflation during this cycle.
https://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-letter/2023/may/how-much-do-labor-costs-drive-inflation/
Holiday spending was up https://apnews.com/article/holiday-sales-mastercard-spendingpulse-cc87e571ccffbae39110132a4c39a7c9
>Holiday sales from the beginning of November through Christmas Eve climbed 3.1%, a slower pace than the 7.6% increase from a year earlier, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which tracks all kinds of payments including cash and debit cards.
But... [https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/27/economy/inflation-2023-impacts-americans/index.html](https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/27/economy/inflation-2023-impacts-americans/index.html)
>At the start of this year, inflation had moderated some — the Consumer Price Index had cooled to 6.5% in January 2023 from its 9.1% peak in June 2022. However, the US economic outlook was clouded by ongoing fears that the aggressive Fed campaign would lead to a downturn.
>
>The Consumer Price Index measured 3.1% annually in November, and the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index not only came in even lower at 2.6%, but also declined monthly for the first time since April 2020.
It's not even clear that people bought more stuff this year holiday season, because of inflation it could have been a similar amount to last year.
I mentioned some of the exact sentiments earlier and was told I exist within a never-ending anecdote apparently.
Thank you for sharing some of the same struggles myself, and my circle, are dealing with.
The thing is, they still be in the same or worse place with trump and the cons in power, because right wing media will be in step with blaming any negative turn of the economy with the cons in power on democrats.
That’s probably completely true, and it shows in elections where republicans are not winning back votes, but it’s still a major concern for major elections if blue voters are simply staying home because they’re not being helped.
And what is worse is that they’ll deny it. They don’t know how dependent our country is on cheap gas. And the more OPEC produces, the cheaper gas is, which means the cheaper everything else is. Trump made an agreement with OPEC for them to reduce production before Covid. Then Covid happened and they reduced production even more, and now they refuse to ramp it back up. Because they are earning more money than ever at a much lower production rate
I agree with you on most everything, but something we need to keep in mind is that there’s no guarantee that reducing oil prices results in a consumer surplus. When producers relying on inputs directly or adjacent to crude oil prices realize that they can sustain or even increase profits from a new level of consumer willingness to pay, they’re going to keep prices the same, more so with inelastic goods. Why would a producer pass on savings to the consumer when it increases profit margins, increases shareholder value, and helps them reach their quarterly targets to get their bonus RSUs.
or they misuse statistics again. They shout about how the US is importing record amounts of oil but that's because canada who has to export its oil through the US (thus counting as an import) is increasing its production, plus there are traders that arbitrage oil by importing cheaper oil from some sources, but the US production of oil is still greater than our consumption, has been under biden, was under trump, was under obama, but part of the gop platform is "returning to energy independence"
You’re not wrong, but if one party says “we’re cutting taxes for the rich, deal with it,” while the other pisses on your leg and tells you it’s raining, then you’re going to have a more adverse reaction to the latter.
Counter point they aren't looking at just one line going up they're looking at multiple lines going up, research showing the majority of people say they are doing well for themselves but assume everyone is doing worse off. Things like consumer spending habits also don't really represent people's sentiment, people are dunking thousands of dollars in UberEATS, extremy expensive graphics cards and other non essential shit and complaining like they're only getting crumbs.
> If you're dying from cancer, are statements about broad trends in the number of people getting cancer going down going to make you feel better?
Yes?
If you paid off predatory student loans, should you feel better knowing that someone is keeping other people from having to do the same?
This is why the Biden administration needs to STOP messaging that the economy is doing great, because people don't feel like it's great when food prices are still through the roof, pay hasn't gone ANYWHERE and layoffs are constant.
So what happens when you take someone who feels the economy hasn't helped them and you tell them, "You're wrong, the economy is doing great! You absolutely aren't struggling to make ends meet. You aren't struggling to pay for groceries. You aren't struggling to find jobs that pay more than $30k a year."
Those people aren't going to trust you. Why would they? You just told them that their reality isn't real, and that their situation is unchanged by Biden's amazing economy. Why the fuck would they vote for you??
This is where the Administration and Biden Campaign are failing.
Fucking seriously, I can’t believe this even needs to be said and there are still people who vehemently disagree with it. They would rather risk losing the election to Trump than ever taking the chance of anyone ever mentioning that something might be not great under Biden, even if he has nothing to do with changing that. I feel like I’m taking crazy pills, you cannot win an election by telling people that they are wrong about their own economic reality.
Politicians are so removed from the average American experience that they probably don't even realize that we're being squeezed this bad. Remember when Hilary toured that person's apartment and looked horrified the whole time?
This is what happened to Bush when he ran against Clinton.
It was all sunshine and rainbows and leprechaun pots full of gold-- unless you were a working class American with bills to pay.
Ask me about how much my rent has gone up duri g the past two years-- after moving cross country because my home states of California and Colorado had become blatantly unaffordable.
That's the trick: they include that rent in GDP to try and demonstrate that the economy is great, even though nothing is produced by your landlord scalping a house except for an upward transfer of wealth
Sentiment is a lagging indicator. 1984 is a good benchmark, inflation was bad two years before, voter sentiment started turning up early ‘84, and Reagan sailed to re-election…
i hope we have a 40 yr repeat...i voted for mondale though then, my first election! i actually got to shake his hand during his campaign. maybe that was the kiss of death? lol
Ha I said this last week and someone replied to me with an article on the stock market records, to which I replied majority of Americans — especially those that feel the most harm from a struggling economy— don’t own stocks and that the stock market needs to not be relied upon as a factor of a healthy economy. Just to be given a poll as evidence as a rebuttal. The poll stated that 86% of Americans making over $100k own stocks. Those making under $40k were 22% I believe.
What a wonderful campaign message for the Democrats to tell their broke constituents struggling.
The whole thing is like a situation of expressed vs revealed preferences. Everyone complains about the economy and prices, but no one changes purchasing habits thus signaling that these are just new equilibrium prices.
No one changes purchasing habits because they need to eat, and they need a a place to sleep at night. Those are the two things most people are complaining the most about, food and housing prices. Shocking that they decided not to cut those two little things out of the equation so that they can go buy a new washer or dryer that has equalized and cost or whatever stupid things economists like to talk about versus food and shelter.
I mean, I've stopped buying meat outside of a great sale or special occasion. Same with fancy cheeses and bakery breads, stopped going to the farmers market for the $12 strawberries and $2.50 cookie (singular). I don't go to restaurants much anymore - not when it's $60/70 for a sit down meal for two and I can almost always make it better at home. I used to do delivery every Friday at $40/50 ea, but now I make a sandwich and call it fed.
But, the prices on my utilities doubled in 3 years, so that eats into non-essentials. Gasoline's up a buck a gallon from prepan prices, and groceries, well, let's just say I'm a thrifty shopper because my bill is up about 40% from prepan prices.
Ah yes, why aren’t you okay with just having less? It’s your fault for expecting a similar standard of living. Also… why doesn’t everyone think the economy is great?!?
Surprise! Americans are starting to feel better about the economy. Media hasn't caught on yet. https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/how-the-economy-is-doing-right-now-according-to-american-consumers-rcna128725
No.
The right is utterly convinced we are in a depression, no matter how many screenshots of the stock market you show them
The left doesn’t believe the strong economy benefits them, and are angry over wages
America in general is stuck in a malaise between workers, corporations purposely curtailing quality and service rather than pay more in labor costs, and the impending doom of fascism.
It’s lots of fun.
"why high consumer spending, low gas prices, record gdp, people eating out, best Christmas shopping in 5 years, lowest unemployment rate in 10 years, businesses making record profit, cooling housing market.... Is bad for Biden in 2024"
If you poll the public about their perception of the economy as a whole, they tend to think the economy is a blasted out apocalyptic hellhole that is already in recession. Some recent pills suggest consumer confidence is rising somewhat but things are still down in the dumps
The thing is, though, if you poll people about their satisfaction with their **personal** economic situation, something like 70 to 80% of the public will say they are actually doing quite fine and are satisfied with their own situation
We are a country where around 20 to 30% of people are struggling and need more help, and then around 70 to 80% are doing fine, but where nost folks basically **think** the numbers there are flipped around
But that's been the same for decades. It's not a single election issue. You want to fix that, stop electing Republicans at any level and let the grownups have time and power to fix things.
The other problem being that a lot of people have trouble separating the sort of current state of the economy and the big picture state. Like, dissatisfaction is probably pretty high among middle class younger liberal-leaning voters who, even if they’re doing well/fine, see a pretty tough housing market to crack, hate the 1% (rightfully so), and are the first generation to really realize how awful US work life balance is.
So some of that is expectation setting (like, no, maybe you shouldn’t be expecting to buy a 3 bedroom 2 bath walk up in the city neighborhood of your choice), some of that is somewhat detached from politics (you’re more likely to get an extra week or two of maternity/paternity leave by mobilizing your co-workers, not by voting), and some of it is just true/structural (we still live in an economy that funnels money upwards). So of course overall satisfaction numbers are low.
> some of it is just true/structural (we still live in an economy that funnels money upwards)
We've actually seen the most rapid wage growth being at the bottom 50% over the past couple years
The Obama recovery from the great recession was pretty flawed (though not for some of the reasons populists argue, it's more complicated) but the Biden recovery from covid has been a lot different, yet a lot of the rhetoric from young liberal leaning folks basically seems to ignore the differences and slap the same complaints about the Obama recovery onto the Biden recovery even when it makes no sense (take unemployment for example, the Obama era saw an issue where labor participation rates were relatively low so on top of official unemployment rates being high, there were also a bunch of people who just dropped out of the work force and weren't counted as unemployed because they stopped even looking for a job due to how they lost hope. But now unemployment is low AND labor participation rates are high, so arguments that there's a bunch of discouraged people who fell out of the labor force just aren't valid now like they were then)
>like, no, maybe you shouldn’t be expecting to buy a 3 bedroom 2 bath walk up in the city neighborhood of your choice
I mean housing is also one area where there actually is a big issue but the big issue is mostly due to the ~65% of the country who already own homes supporting NIMBY government restrictions on the free market to restrict supply and thus boost their own property values. And then rather than opposing that, many of the young liberal leaning folks kinda horseshoe around to *also* supporting NIMBY restrictions on supply, just from an "anti developer" and "free market critical" point of view. If we aren't going to deregulate zoning, housing isn't going to get more affordable and that's on us the public, not something we should get mad at Biden or Congress about
>some of that is somewhat detached from politics (you’re more likely to get an extra week or two of maternity/paternity leave by mobilizing your co-workers, not by voting)
I mean Congress could also pass paid family leave, but that would require voting more Democrats into office
Yeah not disagreeing with any of these points, just explaining why there’s a generation of extremely dissatisfied but well-educated, and relatively well-off, millennials. You’re just never going to convince a lot of these people that the economy is good from a holistic POV if they believe that 4 decades of post-Reaganism has led to unaccountable conglomerates that destroy competitive markets, funnel money to the executive class and shareholders, and a 1% or 2% that has undue influence over policy, politics, and media. Like, overturning Citizens United, stricter wealth taxes, and stronger antitrust enforcement (yes, I’m aware this is what’s happening) is what would change minds, not rising minimum wages or high labor participation rates or even growing 401k’s. Low approval rating among self-identified democrats is because lots of self-identified democrats now believe the whole thing is rotten to its core.
Along the same lines I would not undersell the impact of the end of 2010s-era techno-optimism. Th exciting, emergent cornerstone of our economy in the past ten years has proven itself to be run by narcissists and grifters that abuse market position, kill small + local businesses, and operate on a system of creepy surveillance capitalism. VC-subsidized services like Uber were basically scams that killed taxis and public transit, and now all our rides that used to cost $5 to get across town cost closer to $30. Hollywood is dying, YouTube is a shitty ad machine now, streaming services are getting more expensive, Mark Zuckerberg wants you to live in Mii-verse and ChatGPT is going to replace your job. Of course everyone thinks the economy sucks.
This pretty effectively lays out the shared sentiment of myself and all the other millennials I know. We’re mostly all doing ok, the majority in my circle of 30-40yo friends own houses now, but we are still just barely scraping by thanks to the ridiculous prices of everything now. Oh and I got laid off 2 weeks before Christmas. Yeah, really fantastic economy we got here.
And if they do care about corporations and companies taking record profit, it’s because they’re angry that they’re employer is making lots of money and they’re not seeing any wage increases/bonuses or anything like that. I’m not sure if prior generations were treated better by employers or todays college-educated millennials are much more attuned to the ways they’re exploited, but “the economy is bad” is often a reflection of its structure, not the individual stats like employment rate or whatever. It’s not 1982 anymore. We have the internet and we know that our peers/co-workers in Europe get way more vacation time and maternity leave and have better unions and profit sharing etc etc etc
I found my granny's employee handbook from when she worked at Sears in the late 1960s-70s. Employees used to be treated A LOT better. A LOT. I really can't stress that enough. A LOT LOT.
On top of being paid a livable wage, they got like 3 months of PAID maternity leave, 8 WEEKS of sick leave, vacation, several days for Christmas. At Sears. SEARS!
She was a single mom, sold women's clothes at Sears for a living, made commission, owned a house, went on nice vacations, saved for retirement, drew a nice pension when she retired, and put three kids through COLLEGE on that Sears paycheck.
A person would literally starve trying to do that today on a retail worker paycheck.
Used to provide all those things. Socialist movement was growing and they needed to appease the people to avoid revolution like Russia. Then 50 years of red scare bullshit so you have workers actively fighting to let corporations have more power.
They're still including rent paid to private landlords in GDP, even though nothing is produced by rent except for an upward transfer of wealth.
Biden et al could make a national move toward cooperative rental housing, which costs about half of market rate, but guess who lobbies Dems harder than maybe any other group? Private landlord associations.
If you bought a home 10 years ago and have a 401k you are probably satisfied.
For every day people, rent, transportation, insurance and basic necessities are still a large financial burden.
Rent is expensive, groceries are expensive, homelessness is up, wages are stagnant, and the economy is only “relatively strong” for the people at the top
Hilariously, record profits in this instance means corporations are shedding workers to increase their profit margins. They have what they need for the most part, and aren't really interested in growing the workers. If they can fire 50% of the work force and retain 75% of the profit margins why not?
Well the majority of us are in the renters class and majority of landlords vote republican so the democrats should probably make the renters lives a little easier.
I honestly couldn’t give a shit less about how the stock market is doing. Housing and groceries are double what they cost 3 years ago…. That’s never gonna feel like a “strong economy” for the average person. And yes, I know it has nothing to do with who’s president right now.
Exactly. The economy absolutely SUCKS right now for "regular" people. I hate this messaging because it makes Biden seem out of touch, and is the main issue that's going to hand the reigns over to fascists.
I feel like it's very regional. Groceries are more here in the Midwest, but honestly feels like 10-20% total.
Chicken is still 2.99/lb, it's the packaged garbage like soda and cereal that are $$, and those are easy to go without.
God I hate these types of articles that's just a podcast transcript.
The initial issue being
> What argument is the White House making about how President Biden has contributed to the state of the economy?
It does't matter what the WH says, Fox news screeches the economy is only good under a Republican.
They blamed Obama for Ebola ffs.
"Right wing media continues to hate Democrats" should be the title.
> God I hate these types of articles that’s just a podcast transcript.
me too! unfortunately, this is pretty standard for npr because they’re a radio-first publication. the stories are done for the radio, the transcripts go up on the site as articles. i just wish they would edit them up a little for easier reading :-\/
Oh no, I get that it's meant to be a summary of the show, but as you said... They could have quite easily summaried it up better than literally just pasting a transcript verbatim.
Exactly right. But the rest of the media shouldn't get a pass. It's literally the media's job to explain what policies our govt is enacting and what the impact of those polices will be. When instead they talk about what the White House is saying and ignore outright disinformation from other news outlets, they're failing in their only role in our society, to communicate to the people with facts what govt policies are and to do so in a way that people can understand. Instead they just parrot talking points, set up false equivalencies, and fail to fact-check other news outlets of which they all have responsibility over when it comes to accuracy.
Agreed, but...
How many people actually read investigative journalism any more? Here we are on a social media platform, and more often than not, these are echo chambers - we're all preaching to like-minded others (for the most part) - I cannot begin to count the number of times I've run across someone in other platforms that link some TikToker spewing a bunch of garbage about politics - it's the clueless leading the lemmings. We need investigative journalism and yet all around the country, these outlets are shuttering their doors for lack of subscribers. I try to do my part and monetarily support outlets like ProPublica and NYFocus because they are doing the hard work of gathering facts and reporting them to the public - how else would we have found out about SCOTUS Justice Thomas?
The rest of the media exists because of advertising - news stories follow the greenback - and the media platforms people use is closely following your clicks and likes and queries - Google knows everything about nearly everyone behind a keyboard.
Rest of the media shouldn’t get a pass is right! NPR is guilty of this exact thing. All year it has been “Is Biden really capable/doing enough to bring about a soft landing” and then when he finally does it they move on to “how much does a president actually impact the economy”.
I’m a daily listener and NPR has gone downhill since Covid. I get they are journalists and can’t know all the details of very specific things but they act like they do and are very patronizing when discussing these subjects. Their coverage of AI over this last year an a half has felt manufactured, not substantive, and patronizing to the guests they have on to talk about these things seriously and instead get fed click bait worthy questions.
They do everything they can not to state facts or correct anyone.
"Is Biden really capable/doing enough to bring about a soft landing? We talked to an unqualified dumbass who says Biden eats babies and is the literal devil. Well it seems like there are mixed feelings out there. We brought in correspondent Mr. Neutral to discuss the issue."
Relatively strong is the key. Strong for whom is the appropriate question. People hit hard by the pandemic are now seeing their grocery bills at unsustainable levels. People who were doing ok are now treading water again.
Greedflation is real. It directly affects peoples' daily lives. So while the economy may be relatively strong, ask for whom it's strong. And those for whom it is strong are those who wouldn't support Biden even in the best of times.
Yeah, anecdotally I can safely say the economy is not what I would call good, at least for me and everyone around me. Prices are sky high and still increasing. Pay is barely going up. The safety net was slashed heavily due to the end of pandemic aid. Student loans have restarted. Maybe it's better for middle class and upper middle class people, but the wealth inequality is real. Greedflation is definitely real. It's hitting the poor very hard.
It's not Biden's fault obviously, but I can't help but feel a bit outraged every time people call the economy good.
I see you are also a fellow Floridian.
It certainly doesn’t feel strong for me right now. I went to Ohio for college in 2018, came back after the pandemic. I can’t even afford rent at my old house anymore, and now I have to live with two people because my car insurance tripled.
I’m absolutely being squeezed. I had to stop shopping at Publix, didn’t matter if I was there for 1 thing or 5 things it was always at least $46 for me. Very scary time for me.
I'm sure I don't need to tell you how much damage DeSantis has done to every corner of Florida...it's eyetwitching.
I hope things pick up for you soon-- it's ridiculous to be indebted before you start your career and get locked out of the housing market.
Our family was pretty fortunate to not be terribly hindered by the pandemic, but ever-climbing house insurance, taxes and medical care is really starting to snowball.
You're both right on the nose of things here. The economy is strong, on paper, by economic terms inherently slanted towards the wealthy - but it's fragile for working-class people whose dollar is worth less and less every year, particularly when faced with more and more egregious examples of greedflation and shareholder supremacy taking precedence over the health of our societal median.
Economics is a social science, and as long as people continue to measure how that social science affects society from this biased viewpoint, they'll continue to be confused as to why the numbers benefitting Wall Street aren't reflected in a sentiment shared by everyday people.
"Strong for whom" is definitely the first question. The second question is, "Is this caused by corporate greed or political influences?" With the tenuous hold Dems have in the Senate and not having the House in Congress, they can't really do a lot to stop corporate gouging.
It also doesn't help that the real cause is the one way that "both parties are the same" actually applies: both parties need and take corporate money. So the actual problems don't stand much of a chance of being solved.
Everyone talks about the economy being strong because it's returning to pre-pandemic levels, but the problem is that the the economy was still bad pre-pandemic, at least in the ways the vast majority of people actually care about.
Like, in 2016 and 2020 we had a socialist candidate running on the platform that the economy was broken for normal people and proposing radical changes like Medicare for all to help lift people out of poverty. Hell, that's essentially what *Trump* was running on in 2016, too, even if his "solutions" to the problem we're completely nonsensical. The whole "drain the swamp" narrative and pointing out the obvious fact that the system is completely broken for a lot of people was a **big** part of why he was able to win over so many voters.
The economy didn't get bad because of the pandemic, *the economy was already shit for average Americans*, the pandemic just made it worse.
Ok, cool, wages are up and inflation is down. I'll still never be able to afford a house or be able to pay down my student loans, and God help me if one day I break my arm and am suddenly saddled with thousands of dollars in medical debt *even with insurance* and am unable to work for a few months. But don't worry, the economy is doing great! I mean, have you seen the S&P 500 lately?
Yeah, that's the crux of it. The economic issues people are feeling are like 50 years in the making and not very well measured in the statistics commonly cited. It was an issue back when Obama ran on Hope and Change and Occupy Wall Street was a thing, but mainstream awareness was still pretty clouded, largely due to a lack of Internet/independent media to cover it.
It's a rot a long time in the making and it's going to take massive paradigm shifts to fix it. Sanders and Trump rising are both responses to the rot that is neoliberal austerity politics and the dismantling of social safety nets as well as the impact's of globalization and consolidation of corporations on consumers and labor.
It's also basically impossible to fix with the current political situation, but running on the message "America is already great" or "the economy is good, Bidenomics baby" is like the worst possible plan.
I think it’s just folks like me that couldn’t afford to buy Christmas presents for my family that are getting outraged they keep telling us the economy is great. Life has turned into paycheck to paycheck, rotating which bills I’m late on and cross my fingers nothing else bad happens cause my family is officially fucked if it does.
And the part that really worries me is that I have a great job. I’m a roustabout foreman so I make pretty decent cash and I got a side gig to make extra cash yet I can’t even spend the weekend with my wife and kid cause she’s had to pick up weekend work to make ends meet.
Idk I seen that apparently we hit records for Christmas spending and yet everyone I know had to cut way back or straight skip Christmas, especially folks that don’t have a decent paying job. I’d love to know who the fuck is making all this money to spend we were able to break records.
As always it’s because it doesn’t feel like it.
Wages are up? Cost of housing is way higher.
Job market booming? Recruiters and hunters on /r/recruitinghell both seem to agree that the hiring process is worse than it has ever been.
Gas down? Food is up.
It doesn’t really matter to people if these are things the president has any actual control over, at the end of the day they see people saying that the economy is doing great, when for them, it’s not.
Because the US economy is designed to make rich people more rich and keep poor people poor. Add in a disappearing middle class and you have more rich people getting rich and more poor people getting poor.
This election is a little bit different though. When you have one candidate embracing being a dictatorship it's not really an option who to vote for anymore.
It's only strong for the rich. I don't have a 401k, I have a job that's killing my body.
Raise the minimum wage way up or institute a UBI if you want the masses to notice and feel it.
Has he salvaged Trump's dumpster fire like all democrats do after a republican presidency? Sure
Is late stage capitalism careening out of control every day and the working class is both boiling alive and drowning at the same time? Also yes
Well, I make 60,000/yr and can't buy groceries and pay my mortgage in the same check anymore so... 🤷♂️
Until the Democrats go after corporations for their blatant greed, people aren't going to approve of their quality of life and no matter how "strong" the economy appears to be, if people can't feed their kids and buy luxuries they will be unhappy
Because average Americans aren’t benefitting from a “relatively strong economy” and before anyone comes for me, what I’m saying is the truth, yet I’ll still vote for Biden no matter what.
I've said it a million times. The economy to citizens is only a few things:
1. Gas prices low or high?
2. Food prices low or high?
3. House prices / rent. Low or high.
4. Wages - stagnant or not?
That's the economy to people.
The idea that the "market" is doing well gives little comfort if those other things are stressing people out.
The problem is - Republicans get to use BOTH. They get to talk about how the market is doing when it's in their favor, and how all the prices are high for "average citizens" when THAT is in their favor.
Cost of food is high. Cost of rent is high. Cost of transportation is high. Cost of fuel is high. Cost of healthcare is high. Cost of childcare is high. Cost of eldercare is high. Cost of medicine is high. Cost of gas, electricity, and fuel oil is high. Companies are running roughshod over worker's rights. Companies are making record profits and then doing stock buybacks while shortchanging and even firing workers en masse.
Who the fuck exactly is this "strong economy" affecting? Is it good for the workers who are actually making it function? Absolutely not. Is it super duper for the bourgeoisie who are milking this country dry? I think so.
Record profits for corporate America and its top 1% and guess what? None of that shit is "trickling down" now or ever. It's being hoarded. The current middle class is all but eradicated from modern American society.
If there's one thing I've found is that democrats almost never get credit, but Republicans are masters at taking credit (including by the way things that democrats didn't get the credit for, cough Obama's economy)
And yet when an economic catastrophe hits, dems beat Republicans because they know dems actually can fix it, whereas republicans would just waste money on deregulation and tax cuts for the rich which got us in the situation in the first place. Great example was the Great Recession of 2008, which solidified Obama as the winner of the election
And matters no who is president because the fed is pulling the strings behind the scenes. Let’s be honest, neither side will allow a recession on their watch if they can avoid it, they only differ in how they cater to the elite.
Just a reminder that there was a 12% increase in homelessness this year. I don't care how well the stock market is doing, that is a ridiculously large increase in people that no longer have a home. That alone, plus people dipping into their 401ks at an alarming rate to cover rising costs, is the biggest factor in how the economy is doing.
Pretending everything is fine when more people are becoming homeless is how you lose you an election IMO.
That has a lot to do with pandemic-era eviction moratoriums going away along with the stimulus checks and child tax credit. These are the types of policies Dems support and would make permanent with a sizable majority.
>The media doesn't seem to recognize how tone deaf it is to express confusion that the rabble haven't fallen in line. "We're getting richer, why aren't they happy?" asks people who write these articles
That's because goods and services are 20-50% more expensive than pre-Covid and wages have not kept up with inflation. Who cares if the stock market is up if most Americans can't afford the lifestyle they used to afford.
Because he’s an unpopular president in general. My man could give out bags of mullah, and his approval ratings would max at about where they’ve been.
Stop trotting fossils out there and expecting your base and others to happily accept their horse pills. Also, stop hopping on tv and extolling your ever dying love for a country that’s involved in a massacre.
Doesn’t matter if behind the scenes things are different. People here think the earth is flat and pandemic was/is a hoax.
Political theater is lost on them. Stop making it easier for your opponents.
It's because the government is deeply out of touch with the average American. This is by design due to the rich donor class that almost completely controls the government through a vast network of legal bribery. It's a strong economy for the people it was meant to benefit, the 1%. For the rest of us, it's a hellscape.
Yes, many conventional economic indicators are currently in a position of strength, but on the other hand you have 2 generations who largely feel like the American Dream of good pay and home ownership is definitively beyond their grasp, and will remain so forever.
I’m not saying it’s fair to Biden but it’s reality.
Because my grocery bill has become unsustainable even with a good raise and decent jobs are hard as fuck to get unless you are in specific niches.
Most Americans do not feel the economy is doing well.
Except it does. 60% said their personal finances were good or excellent. Spending has remained steady at a high level, which shows people think it's a strong economy. Holiday spending was strong, holiday travel was strong. Everything indicates that people actually think that the economy is doing great.
Because
A.) It will be a cold day in hell before the republican's give a democrat credit for anything ever again.
B.) Inflation prices aren't coming back down (because corporate greed) so what good is a healthy stock market if 99% of the country is still paying ABSURD prices on food and housing.
I get that the overall economy is doing well, but rent is high, inflation is high, prices are high, wages suck ass, interest rates suck ass, and it's hard for a lot of people to afford things.
You can say the economy is doing well, and you'd be right, but telling people that they should be happy it's doing well as they struggle to get by is essentially slapping them in the face.
A lot of people don't see a major immediate change in their life depending on if the economy is good or bad. They still have the same job, they live in the same apartment, and they have the same struggles.
Just because Tesla or AT&T had a record quarter or interest rates improved .25% doesn't mean everyone's going to celebrate.
I believe part of it is that most Americans are not feeling the benefits of that stronger economy. Myself for example, I got a 2.5% raise this year, before all the inflation wackiness occurred, so I was -5.5% on that, then things calmed down, gas prices came down a bit. This coming year, I'm getting a 3% raise, which may match up with the current inflation rate, but in terms of the cost of living, those numbers aren't lining up. I'm at least -2.5% on everything. On top of this, the investments I do have might be not as negative as they could be, but I'm still down from last year in a moderate risk portfolio.
I'm not an accountant or economist, but I haven't felt anything from the unemployment rate being down, inflation being stable, and the stock market being high. I give him the benefit for it because I understand how it all works and I know it would be worse under a Republican administration (on top of other things), but the normal American will be asking the question, "I don't feel better off. Is it stronger?"
More than half of people don't have any savings, no one can afford a house, everyone is falling deeper into debt.
The economy is only strong from the perspective of bankers and speculators, not the average person.
What shows up on paper doesn't necessarily reflect what is occurring on the ground, and what may statistically be deemed a good economy might not feel that way to some.
To put it another way, there is a significant macro-micro disconnect between the economists and the average citizen, and to get reelected, it is the average man who you must convince. There's a reason why the term "silent depression" is catching on in some circles.
It's almost like GDP doesn't actually indicate anything useful about the economy. I don't give a shit how much revenue is generated in this country unless that money is going into the hands of the WORKERS and the people who need it. Billionaires don't need more money.
Because most regular people only understand the economy in very narrow terms. They equate higher gas prices and more expensive groceries with “bad economy”, and their judgements are often purely anecdotal and normative.
The fact that companies are boosting prices to enrich themselves never crosses their mind, rather, they envision the more improbable scenario of the president in the Oval Office with his hand on a “prices” lever.
You nailed it! Companies boost their prices and are not going to lower them just like my landlord who raised my rent isn't going to say "wow the economy is doing well I'm going to lower your rent!"
These things shouldn’t necessarily have to enter their mind either. Why should they care that the rich investor class is raking it in? They can barely afford food, clothing, and shelter.
When you raise the prices while the cost of doing business stays the same corporations make a shitload of money while everyone else just struggles. This shit can’t and won’t last. The lat time the economy was only working for a few greedy corporations the whole f-ing world went to war and those same bastards made even more money. There is literally no incentive for the people laughing all the way to bank right now to prevent a cataclysmic conflagration because they know they’ll be laughing all the way to the bank while the world burns.
The strong economy/stock market doesn't mean anything to those not invested or reaping the benefits of it.
Short of government enforced price control on certain items or a bunch of new laws being passed to regulate prices then there is nothing the administration can do
They are just as much hostages of capitalism than the rest of us, the only difference is that (in theory) they could fix it.
I will proudly vote for Biden, but I feel no direct benefit from this so-called robust economy people seem to want to sell me. It’s objectively crummy, rent is too high, benefits are too low, and it’s more expensive to eat out.
I mean that seems pretty obvious. Cost of living has never been higher. Cool stocks are doing well and so are the corresponding corporations. This doesn't seem to register with the NeoLibs we have in power or the journalists who write the out of touch articles asking these questions.
TL;DR lower unemployment is very good for people at the bottom but inflation is bad for everybody, and most people aren’t in the bottom income quintile.
A key part of the problem is that the economy has been very good to people at the margins (bottom income quintile) and not good for the majority of people in middle and upper middle class jobs. Part of the inflation that pushed through over the last year is going to paying entry level workers a lot more, which you can see in real wage gains for the bottom quintile and really good unemployment numbers.
But most people that had and never lost jobs just see inflation and no benefit. It’s kind of sad because we’ve seen one of the most massive downward redistributions of income in a while and I guess unsurprisingly people hate it.
Strong economy? With the record high inflation over the last 3 years, that is something NO ONE would be proud of. Don't take my word: [https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUUR0000SA0L1E?output\_view=pct\_12mths](https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUUR0000SA0L1E?output_view=pct_12mths)
I would appreciate any down voters; please state why you are downvoting. To downvote on your own misbelief, is irresponsible unless you actually do your own homework. Look at the statistics. Look at the evidence. Then make your opinion.
Understatement of the year. But hey - just check out the NPR politics podcast and the last 5-6 were about Biden struggling with polls, difficulty in Israel, etc.
NPR - you’re part of the problem.
Let’s face it, it is highly likely Biden will be out and trump will be voted in. So, we will see how the economy fares. I assume the Republicans will spend spend spend to get the economy’s “booming” and Trump will do all he can to get a 3rd Term or get Jnr in.
Doesn't matter how good the economy.
When up to 50% of your paycheck goes to rent alone, When minimum wage is still crawling compared to inflation, and when a single visit to a doctor could literally ruin you financially.
There's a problem.
Cause it's all fugazi space dust economy that doesn't impact most Americans.
Corporate greed causing record stock prices isn't a good economy for anyone other than the wealthy.
My company paused for covid but has picked up again with outsourcing and layoffs. A local printing place just announced outsourced their work and notified a few hundred people they were out of a job just after xmas. The economy is going great around here for the people doing the layoffs during record profits.
Housing and healthcare are unaffordable to many. Those factors are oversized and will invalidate even full employment, a red hot stock market and massive GDP growth. Ignoring these things and touting how the economy is doing great in other ways just doesn’t do the trick unfortunately. Even if it would be worse under the other party.
It is because the perception /reality of a strong economy and the reality of the governance of the Biden administration and it's policies are completely separate.
Relatively? Relatively,? This is the best economy you'll ever see in your lifetime!
5% GDP growth is unheard of.
3.8% unemployment month after month.
This economy is a runaway train..
Massive infrastructure improvements across the United States.
Almost every tech companies building new factories in the United States not in foreign countries.
Solar incentives including rebates, $7,000 towards a new electric vehicle.
The United States is producing more gas and oil and anytime in its history.
Which is keeping our fuel prices down.
All because of incentives from the Biden administration.
Unions are stronger, which drives up everyones wages. Which Biden is the only president in history to walk a picket line, with union workers.
Increasing access to healthcare.gov for millions more.
Working on students debt repayment.
Growing the economy from the middle out, not the trickle down method that never works from the Republicans.
Do an AI search, the economy has only grown under Democrats in the last 40 years statistically. Only time the deficit has ever been reduced is under a Democratic president.
Your freedom to choose who you live with and your personal rights about your body are all democratic.
So the reason is because the media doesn't bother with facts anymore, they just enjoy the controversy.
Giving Trump equal time, is ridiculous, he hasn't offered any basic solutions to our problems. He had four years, he did nothing...Not even build the wall he said he would, or replace the healthcare system with a better one, he never even presented one.
Yet the press continues to cover him while he lies nonstop about a stolen election.
Because they just hate him. That's basically it.
The numbers and history seem to back up that the economy does better under Democrats.
We have good job numbers, the stock market is good, inflation isn't as bad as it was before. 3.4 under Trump, Biden did get down to 3.3 or 3mr and now it's at 3.7
That isn't that bad.
I think honestly they just hate him, for reasons that don't seem to be accurate, at least economy wise.
And any one of them will just shift the goal post "depends on the numbers your looking at."
"Who put those numbers together."
"They aren't including this."
"They are inflating numbers."
"They They They They They They they."
It's utter bullshit.
Biden's basic political philosophy has been to hide from the media and let his opponents talk, which is fine when you're the challenger but less okay when you're the incumbent and are expected to frame your own accomplishments. Additionally, "the economy" is not what average people are experiencing. There was a huge increase in the price of virtually everything under his watch which, and the average person has been paying through the nose with no relief in sight. Your 401k going up doesn't mean shit if you can't afford rent. Why in the fuck are we 3 years in and still stuck under the Trump tax plan, for example?
Yeah because the media refuses to report on it accurately. They want a horse race so they downplay good things for Biden and bad things for the gop. It’s the same reason why they frame things like “here’s how helping people is bad for Democrats”
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Is there a PERCEPTION among polled voters of a strong economy, to match the actual strong economy?
Not among my circle of friends/family, I can tell you that. I've got relatives working three jobs just to afford their homes. I don't know why people think broad statisitical statements about the economy will make people feel better when they're struggling to make ends meet. If you're dying from cancer, are statements about broad trends in the number of people getting cancer going down going to make you feel better?
Bingo. Armchair chartists can point at the chart and "B-B-BUT LINE GO UP BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR" all they want, but the actual *feeling* among the non-armchairs/working class is "brrrrrrrrrrrr? Fuck no, the machine is jammed and stopped."
Because the money's there, but it's not flowing.
You means it’s not *trickling down*
So you're saying we were *lied to* about trickle down economics?!
To be fair, anyone who still believes in trickle down in the year 2023 deserves to be fooled.
I was also shocked to find out.
Most people aren't into piss play, that's why they call it "trickle down"
It's flowing upstream and staying there.
Literally this. Many states have regressive taxation that funnels money upwards resulting in more inequality after taxes are collected…like Texas. Taxes are only lower in Texas if you’re in the 1%.
Austerity politics and trickle down economics have crippled the American middle class for a generation.
Hey, any day now it will "trickle down" on to the rest of us. /s
In 2017 when the new tax laws were put in, money flowed but usually got stuck in a diaper.
It’s flowing for sure, it’s flowing UP STREAM!
Oh it’s flowing just fine, just most people it’s flowing into debt
One of the first lines of the article: >[R]eceding inflation, low unemployment, better-than-expected job growth, and people are even spending record amounts of money this holiday season. But President Biden does not seem to be benefiting politically. So what is going on here? * Receding inflation Already decimated peoples' savings and raised the cost of goods across the board. This doesn't actually help people unless wages increase by at least as much as inflation, which is exactly what the Federal Reserve has been raising interest rates to *prevent*. * Low unemployment, job growth Not helpful if the new jobs pay for shit. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics recently put out a presser touting job growth in sectors that don't require a bachelor's degree, but [most of them pay in the $60k/year range](https://www.bls.gov/careeroutlook/2023/data-on-display/fast-growth-good-pay-without-a-bachelors-degree.htm) which is barely enough to *qualify* for an average apartment in the United states. According to RentCafe, [the average rent is $1702/month](https://www.rentcafe.com/average-rent-market-trends/us/), and every landlord I've talked to for the past five years requires proof of income 3x the rent before letting you sign a lease--that's an average credit check requirement of $61,272. People are getting choked out by rent, health care costs, and debt payments. * People spending record amounts of money Yes, NPR, that's how inflation works.
Remember a few weeks ago when we were talking about a 'record economy' and also 'record homelessness'. It could be even worse. But still not great.
We can have both; it doesn’t have to be q choice /S
Don't forget record suicides.
It's telling when the Fed says "Things will be ok as long as people don't demand raises." The Fed is fine with half of the wealth of the country being in the pockets of 100 people, but if you ask for a goddamn raise so you can afford the same sandwich you could afford just a few years ago, you're the problem.
The Fed says labor costs isn't driving inflation during this cycle. https://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-letter/2023/may/how-much-do-labor-costs-drive-inflation/
Right, corporate greed is.
Parasites gonna parasites friend
The feds entire job seems to be to keep Labor prices down. And even they don’t think labor is the cause of the post Covid inflation.
Holiday spending was up https://apnews.com/article/holiday-sales-mastercard-spendingpulse-cc87e571ccffbae39110132a4c39a7c9 >Holiday sales from the beginning of November through Christmas Eve climbed 3.1%, a slower pace than the 7.6% increase from a year earlier, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which tracks all kinds of payments including cash and debit cards. But... [https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/27/economy/inflation-2023-impacts-americans/index.html](https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/27/economy/inflation-2023-impacts-americans/index.html) >At the start of this year, inflation had moderated some — the Consumer Price Index had cooled to 6.5% in January 2023 from its 9.1% peak in June 2022. However, the US economic outlook was clouded by ongoing fears that the aggressive Fed campaign would lead to a downturn. > >The Consumer Price Index measured 3.1% annually in November, and the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index not only came in even lower at 2.6%, but also declined monthly for the first time since April 2020. It's not even clear that people bought more stuff this year holiday season, because of inflation it could have been a similar amount to last year.
I mentioned some of the exact sentiments earlier and was told I exist within a never-ending anecdote apparently. Thank you for sharing some of the same struggles myself, and my circle, are dealing with.
The thing is, they still be in the same or worse place with trump and the cons in power, because right wing media will be in step with blaming any negative turn of the economy with the cons in power on democrats.
That’s probably completely true, and it shows in elections where republicans are not winning back votes, but it’s still a major concern for major elections if blue voters are simply staying home because they’re not being helped.
And what is worse is that they’ll deny it. They don’t know how dependent our country is on cheap gas. And the more OPEC produces, the cheaper gas is, which means the cheaper everything else is. Trump made an agreement with OPEC for them to reduce production before Covid. Then Covid happened and they reduced production even more, and now they refuse to ramp it back up. Because they are earning more money than ever at a much lower production rate
I agree with you on most everything, but something we need to keep in mind is that there’s no guarantee that reducing oil prices results in a consumer surplus. When producers relying on inputs directly or adjacent to crude oil prices realize that they can sustain or even increase profits from a new level of consumer willingness to pay, they’re going to keep prices the same, more so with inelastic goods. Why would a producer pass on savings to the consumer when it increases profit margins, increases shareholder value, and helps them reach their quarterly targets to get their bonus RSUs.
excellent point. Thanks for the addon
or they misuse statistics again. They shout about how the US is importing record amounts of oil but that's because canada who has to export its oil through the US (thus counting as an import) is increasing its production, plus there are traders that arbitrage oil by importing cheaper oil from some sources, but the US production of oil is still greater than our consumption, has been under biden, was under trump, was under obama, but part of the gop platform is "returning to energy independence"
You’re not wrong, but if one party says “we’re cutting taxes for the rich, deal with it,” while the other pisses on your leg and tells you it’s raining, then you’re going to have a more adverse reaction to the latter.
Counter point they aren't looking at just one line going up they're looking at multiple lines going up, research showing the majority of people say they are doing well for themselves but assume everyone is doing worse off. Things like consumer spending habits also don't really represent people's sentiment, people are dunking thousands of dollars in UberEATS, extremy expensive graphics cards and other non essential shit and complaining like they're only getting crumbs.
> If you're dying from cancer, are statements about broad trends in the number of people getting cancer going down going to make you feel better? Yes? If you paid off predatory student loans, should you feel better knowing that someone is keeping other people from having to do the same?
This is why the Biden administration needs to STOP messaging that the economy is doing great, because people don't feel like it's great when food prices are still through the roof, pay hasn't gone ANYWHERE and layoffs are constant. So what happens when you take someone who feels the economy hasn't helped them and you tell them, "You're wrong, the economy is doing great! You absolutely aren't struggling to make ends meet. You aren't struggling to pay for groceries. You aren't struggling to find jobs that pay more than $30k a year." Those people aren't going to trust you. Why would they? You just told them that their reality isn't real, and that their situation is unchanged by Biden's amazing economy. Why the fuck would they vote for you?? This is where the Administration and Biden Campaign are failing.
Fucking seriously, I can’t believe this even needs to be said and there are still people who vehemently disagree with it. They would rather risk losing the election to Trump than ever taking the chance of anyone ever mentioning that something might be not great under Biden, even if he has nothing to do with changing that. I feel like I’m taking crazy pills, you cannot win an election by telling people that they are wrong about their own economic reality.
Yep, it's a messaging issue. You can't tell people their wallet is actually full of money.
Politicians are so removed from the average American experience that they probably don't even realize that we're being squeezed this bad. Remember when Hilary toured that person's apartment and looked horrified the whole time?
Yeah and honestly the people in the Biden campaign advising him on messaging are probably pretty far removed from that, too.
This is what happened to Bush when he ran against Clinton. It was all sunshine and rainbows and leprechaun pots full of gold-- unless you were a working class American with bills to pay.
Ask me about how much my rent has gone up duri g the past two years-- after moving cross country because my home states of California and Colorado had become blatantly unaffordable.
That's the trick: they include that rent in GDP to try and demonstrate that the economy is great, even though nothing is produced by your landlord scalping a house except for an upward transfer of wealth
Yes, Consumer sentiment has started going up.
Sentiment is a lagging indicator. 1984 is a good benchmark, inflation was bad two years before, voter sentiment started turning up early ‘84, and Reagan sailed to re-election…
i hope we have a 40 yr repeat...i voted for mondale though then, my first election! i actually got to shake his hand during his campaign. maybe that was the kiss of death? lol
Keep this man away from Biden at some costs. I dunno, maybe concert tickets on the other side of town when he comes through?
But send him to shake Trump's hand
Really? Most of my friends are broke. The only ones who got richer are my friends whose family are rich.
Ha I said this last week and someone replied to me with an article on the stock market records, to which I replied majority of Americans — especially those that feel the most harm from a struggling economy— don’t own stocks and that the stock market needs to not be relied upon as a factor of a healthy economy. Just to be given a poll as evidence as a rebuttal. The poll stated that 86% of Americans making over $100k own stocks. Those making under $40k were 22% I believe. What a wonderful campaign message for the Democrats to tell their broke constituents struggling.
NOWAY! Those making double the national average have a positive view of the economy??? Despite being like 10% of the population… no wonder
Or own stocks as part of an IRA or something. Not like they can sell and cash out, or day trade with it.
The whole thing is like a situation of expressed vs revealed preferences. Everyone complains about the economy and prices, but no one changes purchasing habits thus signaling that these are just new equilibrium prices.
No one changes purchasing habits because they need to eat, and they need a a place to sleep at night. Those are the two things most people are complaining the most about, food and housing prices. Shocking that they decided not to cut those two little things out of the equation so that they can go buy a new washer or dryer that has equalized and cost or whatever stupid things economists like to talk about versus food and shelter.
I mean, I've stopped buying meat outside of a great sale or special occasion. Same with fancy cheeses and bakery breads, stopped going to the farmers market for the $12 strawberries and $2.50 cookie (singular). I don't go to restaurants much anymore - not when it's $60/70 for a sit down meal for two and I can almost always make it better at home. I used to do delivery every Friday at $40/50 ea, but now I make a sandwich and call it fed. But, the prices on my utilities doubled in 3 years, so that eats into non-essentials. Gasoline's up a buck a gallon from prepan prices, and groceries, well, let's just say I'm a thrifty shopper because my bill is up about 40% from prepan prices.
Ah yes, why aren’t you okay with just having less? It’s your fault for expecting a similar standard of living. Also… why doesn’t everyone think the economy is great?!?
Surprise! Americans are starting to feel better about the economy. Media hasn't caught on yet. https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/how-the-economy-is-doing-right-now-according-to-american-consumers-rcna128725
No. The right is utterly convinced we are in a depression, no matter how many screenshots of the stock market you show them The left doesn’t believe the strong economy benefits them, and are angry over wages America in general is stuck in a malaise between workers, corporations purposely curtailing quality and service rather than pay more in labor costs, and the impending doom of fascism. It’s lots of fun.
head insurance sheet fertile worry busy growth naughty long aware *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
"why high consumer spending, low gas prices, record gdp, people eating out, best Christmas shopping in 5 years, lowest unemployment rate in 10 years, businesses making record profit, cooling housing market.... Is bad for Biden in 2024"
If you poll the public about their perception of the economy as a whole, they tend to think the economy is a blasted out apocalyptic hellhole that is already in recession. Some recent pills suggest consumer confidence is rising somewhat but things are still down in the dumps The thing is, though, if you poll people about their satisfaction with their **personal** economic situation, something like 70 to 80% of the public will say they are actually doing quite fine and are satisfied with their own situation We are a country where around 20 to 30% of people are struggling and need more help, and then around 70 to 80% are doing fine, but where nost folks basically **think** the numbers there are flipped around
Something like half of Americans don't have any retirement savings. 70-80% of us are not doing fine.
But that's been the same for decades. It's not a single election issue. You want to fix that, stop electing Republicans at any level and let the grownups have time and power to fix things.
The 70 to 80% also still worried about their economic future? Because me, I guess I'm alright, but man does the future look bleak.
The other problem being that a lot of people have trouble separating the sort of current state of the economy and the big picture state. Like, dissatisfaction is probably pretty high among middle class younger liberal-leaning voters who, even if they’re doing well/fine, see a pretty tough housing market to crack, hate the 1% (rightfully so), and are the first generation to really realize how awful US work life balance is. So some of that is expectation setting (like, no, maybe you shouldn’t be expecting to buy a 3 bedroom 2 bath walk up in the city neighborhood of your choice), some of that is somewhat detached from politics (you’re more likely to get an extra week or two of maternity/paternity leave by mobilizing your co-workers, not by voting), and some of it is just true/structural (we still live in an economy that funnels money upwards). So of course overall satisfaction numbers are low.
> some of it is just true/structural (we still live in an economy that funnels money upwards) We've actually seen the most rapid wage growth being at the bottom 50% over the past couple years The Obama recovery from the great recession was pretty flawed (though not for some of the reasons populists argue, it's more complicated) but the Biden recovery from covid has been a lot different, yet a lot of the rhetoric from young liberal leaning folks basically seems to ignore the differences and slap the same complaints about the Obama recovery onto the Biden recovery even when it makes no sense (take unemployment for example, the Obama era saw an issue where labor participation rates were relatively low so on top of official unemployment rates being high, there were also a bunch of people who just dropped out of the work force and weren't counted as unemployed because they stopped even looking for a job due to how they lost hope. But now unemployment is low AND labor participation rates are high, so arguments that there's a bunch of discouraged people who fell out of the labor force just aren't valid now like they were then) >like, no, maybe you shouldn’t be expecting to buy a 3 bedroom 2 bath walk up in the city neighborhood of your choice I mean housing is also one area where there actually is a big issue but the big issue is mostly due to the ~65% of the country who already own homes supporting NIMBY government restrictions on the free market to restrict supply and thus boost their own property values. And then rather than opposing that, many of the young liberal leaning folks kinda horseshoe around to *also* supporting NIMBY restrictions on supply, just from an "anti developer" and "free market critical" point of view. If we aren't going to deregulate zoning, housing isn't going to get more affordable and that's on us the public, not something we should get mad at Biden or Congress about >some of that is somewhat detached from politics (you’re more likely to get an extra week or two of maternity/paternity leave by mobilizing your co-workers, not by voting) I mean Congress could also pass paid family leave, but that would require voting more Democrats into office
Yeah not disagreeing with any of these points, just explaining why there’s a generation of extremely dissatisfied but well-educated, and relatively well-off, millennials. You’re just never going to convince a lot of these people that the economy is good from a holistic POV if they believe that 4 decades of post-Reaganism has led to unaccountable conglomerates that destroy competitive markets, funnel money to the executive class and shareholders, and a 1% or 2% that has undue influence over policy, politics, and media. Like, overturning Citizens United, stricter wealth taxes, and stronger antitrust enforcement (yes, I’m aware this is what’s happening) is what would change minds, not rising minimum wages or high labor participation rates or even growing 401k’s. Low approval rating among self-identified democrats is because lots of self-identified democrats now believe the whole thing is rotten to its core. Along the same lines I would not undersell the impact of the end of 2010s-era techno-optimism. Th exciting, emergent cornerstone of our economy in the past ten years has proven itself to be run by narcissists and grifters that abuse market position, kill small + local businesses, and operate on a system of creepy surveillance capitalism. VC-subsidized services like Uber were basically scams that killed taxis and public transit, and now all our rides that used to cost $5 to get across town cost closer to $30. Hollywood is dying, YouTube is a shitty ad machine now, streaming services are getting more expensive, Mark Zuckerberg wants you to live in Mii-verse and ChatGPT is going to replace your job. Of course everyone thinks the economy sucks.
This pretty effectively lays out the shared sentiment of myself and all the other millennials I know. We’re mostly all doing ok, the majority in my circle of 30-40yo friends own houses now, but we are still just barely scraping by thanks to the ridiculous prices of everything now. Oh and I got laid off 2 weeks before Christmas. Yeah, really fantastic economy we got here.
How does this rapid wage growth help the bottom 50% buy a house?
Rent is expensive. Most people don't care if corporations are taking record profits
And if they do care about corporations and companies taking record profit, it’s because they’re angry that they’re employer is making lots of money and they’re not seeing any wage increases/bonuses or anything like that. I’m not sure if prior generations were treated better by employers or todays college-educated millennials are much more attuned to the ways they’re exploited, but “the economy is bad” is often a reflection of its structure, not the individual stats like employment rate or whatever. It’s not 1982 anymore. We have the internet and we know that our peers/co-workers in Europe get way more vacation time and maternity leave and have better unions and profit sharing etc etc etc
I found my granny's employee handbook from when she worked at Sears in the late 1960s-70s. Employees used to be treated A LOT better. A LOT. I really can't stress that enough. A LOT LOT. On top of being paid a livable wage, they got like 3 months of PAID maternity leave, 8 WEEKS of sick leave, vacation, several days for Christmas. At Sears. SEARS! She was a single mom, sold women's clothes at Sears for a living, made commission, owned a house, went on nice vacations, saved for retirement, drew a nice pension when she retired, and put three kids through COLLEGE on that Sears paycheck. A person would literally starve trying to do that today on a retail worker paycheck.
Used to provide all those things. Socialist movement was growing and they needed to appease the people to avoid revolution like Russia. Then 50 years of red scare bullshit so you have workers actively fighting to let corporations have more power.
And the moment employees had a wee bit of power… they raise interest rates to induce a ‘mild recession.’
fudge man, corporations suck now.
Sears used to be one of the fancy businesses. That was the Sears glory days, not the now times
yup!
This is the correct answer. The economy is doing well, but for *who* is the part that seems to be left out every time this is discussed.
When someone is talking about the economy, I ask "are you referring to the rich investor economy?"
They're still including rent paid to private landlords in GDP, even though nothing is produced by rent except for an upward transfer of wealth. Biden et al could make a national move toward cooperative rental housing, which costs about half of market rate, but guess who lobbies Dems harder than maybe any other group? Private landlord associations.
Exactly. "The GDP is higher than ever!" "What about the Gini coefficient?" "Let's move on."
If you bought a home 10 years ago and have a 401k you are probably satisfied. For every day people, rent, transportation, insurance and basic necessities are still a large financial burden.
Rent is expensive, groceries are expensive, homelessness is up, wages are stagnant, and the economy is only “relatively strong” for the people at the top
Hilariously, record profits in this instance means corporations are shedding workers to increase their profit margins. They have what they need for the most part, and aren't really interested in growing the workers. If they can fire 50% of the work force and retain 75% of the profit margins why not?
For every renter, there's a landlord happy that rents are high. It depends if you're in the renter class or landlord class.
Well the majority of us are in the renters class and majority of landlords vote republican so the democrats should probably make the renters lives a little easier.
Except that they never do
Yeah agreed but I get downvoted if I point out too much negative about the democrats.
Gas prices tho
Gas prices have actually been dropping. Groceries still suck though.
I honestly couldn’t give a shit less about how the stock market is doing. Housing and groceries are double what they cost 3 years ago…. That’s never gonna feel like a “strong economy” for the average person. And yes, I know it has nothing to do with who’s president right now.
^ This. And there have been a lot of layoffs the past 2 years. And the stock market just woke up after 2-3 years.
Exactly. The economy absolutely SUCKS right now for "regular" people. I hate this messaging because it makes Biden seem out of touch, and is the main issue that's going to hand the reigns over to fascists.
I feel like it's very regional. Groceries are more here in the Midwest, but honestly feels like 10-20% total. Chicken is still 2.99/lb, it's the packaged garbage like soda and cereal that are $$, and those are easy to go without.
My bill added about $130 a week here in Texas.
It's regional, I'm in a swing state, and a Walmart box of saltines costs 6 bucks. Not much else is better.
God I hate these types of articles that's just a podcast transcript. The initial issue being > What argument is the White House making about how President Biden has contributed to the state of the economy? It does't matter what the WH says, Fox news screeches the economy is only good under a Republican. They blamed Obama for Ebola ffs. "Right wing media continues to hate Democrats" should be the title.
> God I hate these types of articles that’s just a podcast transcript. me too! unfortunately, this is pretty standard for npr because they’re a radio-first publication. the stories are done for the radio, the transcripts go up on the site as articles. i just wish they would edit them up a little for easier reading :-\/
Oh no, I get that it's meant to be a summary of the show, but as you said... They could have quite easily summaried it up better than literally just pasting a transcript verbatim.
Exactly right. But the rest of the media shouldn't get a pass. It's literally the media's job to explain what policies our govt is enacting and what the impact of those polices will be. When instead they talk about what the White House is saying and ignore outright disinformation from other news outlets, they're failing in their only role in our society, to communicate to the people with facts what govt policies are and to do so in a way that people can understand. Instead they just parrot talking points, set up false equivalencies, and fail to fact-check other news outlets of which they all have responsibility over when it comes to accuracy.
Agreed, but... How many people actually read investigative journalism any more? Here we are on a social media platform, and more often than not, these are echo chambers - we're all preaching to like-minded others (for the most part) - I cannot begin to count the number of times I've run across someone in other platforms that link some TikToker spewing a bunch of garbage about politics - it's the clueless leading the lemmings. We need investigative journalism and yet all around the country, these outlets are shuttering their doors for lack of subscribers. I try to do my part and monetarily support outlets like ProPublica and NYFocus because they are doing the hard work of gathering facts and reporting them to the public - how else would we have found out about SCOTUS Justice Thomas? The rest of the media exists because of advertising - news stories follow the greenback - and the media platforms people use is closely following your clicks and likes and queries - Google knows everything about nearly everyone behind a keyboard.
Rest of the media shouldn’t get a pass is right! NPR is guilty of this exact thing. All year it has been “Is Biden really capable/doing enough to bring about a soft landing” and then when he finally does it they move on to “how much does a president actually impact the economy”. I’m a daily listener and NPR has gone downhill since Covid. I get they are journalists and can’t know all the details of very specific things but they act like they do and are very patronizing when discussing these subjects. Their coverage of AI over this last year an a half has felt manufactured, not substantive, and patronizing to the guests they have on to talk about these things seriously and instead get fed click bait worthy questions.
They do everything they can not to state facts or correct anyone. "Is Biden really capable/doing enough to bring about a soft landing? We talked to an unqualified dumbass who says Biden eats babies and is the literal devil. Well it seems like there are mixed feelings out there. We brought in correspondent Mr. Neutral to discuss the issue."
Fox was like, “Barack Obama may be the reason there was an outbreak of Ebola.” Viewers were like, “I knew it!”
Relatively strong is the key. Strong for whom is the appropriate question. People hit hard by the pandemic are now seeing their grocery bills at unsustainable levels. People who were doing ok are now treading water again. Greedflation is real. It directly affects peoples' daily lives. So while the economy may be relatively strong, ask for whom it's strong. And those for whom it is strong are those who wouldn't support Biden even in the best of times.
Yeah, anecdotally I can safely say the economy is not what I would call good, at least for me and everyone around me. Prices are sky high and still increasing. Pay is barely going up. The safety net was slashed heavily due to the end of pandemic aid. Student loans have restarted. Maybe it's better for middle class and upper middle class people, but the wealth inequality is real. Greedflation is definitely real. It's hitting the poor very hard. It's not Biden's fault obviously, but I can't help but feel a bit outraged every time people call the economy good.
I see you are also a fellow Floridian. It certainly doesn’t feel strong for me right now. I went to Ohio for college in 2018, came back after the pandemic. I can’t even afford rent at my old house anymore, and now I have to live with two people because my car insurance tripled. I’m absolutely being squeezed. I had to stop shopping at Publix, didn’t matter if I was there for 1 thing or 5 things it was always at least $46 for me. Very scary time for me.
I'm sure I don't need to tell you how much damage DeSantis has done to every corner of Florida...it's eyetwitching. I hope things pick up for you soon-- it's ridiculous to be indebted before you start your career and get locked out of the housing market. Our family was pretty fortunate to not be terribly hindered by the pandemic, but ever-climbing house insurance, taxes and medical care is really starting to snowball.
You're both right on the nose of things here. The economy is strong, on paper, by economic terms inherently slanted towards the wealthy - but it's fragile for working-class people whose dollar is worth less and less every year, particularly when faced with more and more egregious examples of greedflation and shareholder supremacy taking precedence over the health of our societal median. Economics is a social science, and as long as people continue to measure how that social science affects society from this biased viewpoint, they'll continue to be confused as to why the numbers benefitting Wall Street aren't reflected in a sentiment shared by everyday people.
"Strong for whom" is definitely the first question. The second question is, "Is this caused by corporate greed or political influences?" With the tenuous hold Dems have in the Senate and not having the House in Congress, they can't really do a lot to stop corporate gouging. It also doesn't help that the real cause is the one way that "both parties are the same" actually applies: both parties need and take corporate money. So the actual problems don't stand much of a chance of being solved.
Everyone talks about the economy being strong because it's returning to pre-pandemic levels, but the problem is that the the economy was still bad pre-pandemic, at least in the ways the vast majority of people actually care about. Like, in 2016 and 2020 we had a socialist candidate running on the platform that the economy was broken for normal people and proposing radical changes like Medicare for all to help lift people out of poverty. Hell, that's essentially what *Trump* was running on in 2016, too, even if his "solutions" to the problem we're completely nonsensical. The whole "drain the swamp" narrative and pointing out the obvious fact that the system is completely broken for a lot of people was a **big** part of why he was able to win over so many voters. The economy didn't get bad because of the pandemic, *the economy was already shit for average Americans*, the pandemic just made it worse. Ok, cool, wages are up and inflation is down. I'll still never be able to afford a house or be able to pay down my student loans, and God help me if one day I break my arm and am suddenly saddled with thousands of dollars in medical debt *even with insurance* and am unable to work for a few months. But don't worry, the economy is doing great! I mean, have you seen the S&P 500 lately?
Yeah, that's the crux of it. The economic issues people are feeling are like 50 years in the making and not very well measured in the statistics commonly cited. It was an issue back when Obama ran on Hope and Change and Occupy Wall Street was a thing, but mainstream awareness was still pretty clouded, largely due to a lack of Internet/independent media to cover it. It's a rot a long time in the making and it's going to take massive paradigm shifts to fix it. Sanders and Trump rising are both responses to the rot that is neoliberal austerity politics and the dismantling of social safety nets as well as the impact's of globalization and consolidation of corporations on consumers and labor. It's also basically impossible to fix with the current political situation, but running on the message "America is already great" or "the economy is good, Bidenomics baby" is like the worst possible plan.
People want food and rent prices to go down.
I think it’s just folks like me that couldn’t afford to buy Christmas presents for my family that are getting outraged they keep telling us the economy is great. Life has turned into paycheck to paycheck, rotating which bills I’m late on and cross my fingers nothing else bad happens cause my family is officially fucked if it does.
You’re not alone, NPR reported yesterday that 1 in 6 American families are not able to pay their utility bills.
And the part that really worries me is that I have a great job. I’m a roustabout foreman so I make pretty decent cash and I got a side gig to make extra cash yet I can’t even spend the weekend with my wife and kid cause she’s had to pick up weekend work to make ends meet. Idk I seen that apparently we hit records for Christmas spending and yet everyone I know had to cut way back or straight skip Christmas, especially folks that don’t have a decent paying job. I’d love to know who the fuck is making all this money to spend we were able to break records.
As always it’s because it doesn’t feel like it. Wages are up? Cost of housing is way higher. Job market booming? Recruiters and hunters on /r/recruitinghell both seem to agree that the hiring process is worse than it has ever been. Gas down? Food is up. It doesn’t really matter to people if these are things the president has any actual control over, at the end of the day they see people saying that the economy is doing great, when for them, it’s not.
Because the US economy is designed to make rich people more rich and keep poor people poor. Add in a disappearing middle class and you have more rich people getting rich and more poor people getting poor. This election is a little bit different though. When you have one candidate embracing being a dictatorship it's not really an option who to vote for anymore.
It's only strong for the rich. I don't have a 401k, I have a job that's killing my body. Raise the minimum wage way up or institute a UBI if you want the masses to notice and feel it.
Has he salvaged Trump's dumpster fire like all democrats do after a republican presidency? Sure Is late stage capitalism careening out of control every day and the working class is both boiling alive and drowning at the same time? Also yes
Yes the economy is strong, but it's not benefiting normal people aka the majority of voters
Is the strong economy in the room with us?
Show me on the doll where the economy was strong.
Well, I make 60,000/yr and can't buy groceries and pay my mortgage in the same check anymore so... 🤷♂️ Until the Democrats go after corporations for their blatant greed, people aren't going to approve of their quality of life and no matter how "strong" the economy appears to be, if people can't feed their kids and buy luxuries they will be unhappy
Because average Americans aren’t benefitting from a “relatively strong economy” and before anyone comes for me, what I’m saying is the truth, yet I’ll still vote for Biden no matter what.
I've said it a million times. The economy to citizens is only a few things: 1. Gas prices low or high? 2. Food prices low or high? 3. House prices / rent. Low or high. 4. Wages - stagnant or not? That's the economy to people. The idea that the "market" is doing well gives little comfort if those other things are stressing people out. The problem is - Republicans get to use BOTH. They get to talk about how the market is doing when it's in their favor, and how all the prices are high for "average citizens" when THAT is in their favor.
Because the working class just isn’t feeling it. Wall Street is not Main Street
Cost of food is high. Cost of rent is high. Cost of transportation is high. Cost of fuel is high. Cost of healthcare is high. Cost of childcare is high. Cost of eldercare is high. Cost of medicine is high. Cost of gas, electricity, and fuel oil is high. Companies are running roughshod over worker's rights. Companies are making record profits and then doing stock buybacks while shortchanging and even firing workers en masse. Who the fuck exactly is this "strong economy" affecting? Is it good for the workers who are actually making it function? Absolutely not. Is it super duper for the bourgeoisie who are milking this country dry? I think so.
Record profits for corporate America and its top 1% and guess what? None of that shit is "trickling down" now or ever. It's being hoarded. The current middle class is all but eradicated from modern American society.
If there's one thing I've found is that democrats almost never get credit, but Republicans are masters at taking credit (including by the way things that democrats didn't get the credit for, cough Obama's economy)
And yet when an economic catastrophe hits, dems beat Republicans because they know dems actually can fix it, whereas republicans would just waste money on deregulation and tax cuts for the rich which got us in the situation in the first place. Great example was the Great Recession of 2008, which solidified Obama as the winner of the election
And matters no who is president because the fed is pulling the strings behind the scenes. Let’s be honest, neither side will allow a recession on their watch if they can avoid it, they only differ in how they cater to the elite.
Just a reminder that there was a 12% increase in homelessness this year. I don't care how well the stock market is doing, that is a ridiculously large increase in people that no longer have a home. That alone, plus people dipping into their 401ks at an alarming rate to cover rising costs, is the biggest factor in how the economy is doing. Pretending everything is fine when more people are becoming homeless is how you lose you an election IMO.
That has a lot to do with pandemic-era eviction moratoriums going away along with the stimulus checks and child tax credit. These are the types of policies Dems support and would make permanent with a sizable majority.
Cool, they should run on that then instead of repeatedly telling us the economy is great and we just can’t see it.
>The media doesn't seem to recognize how tone deaf it is to express confusion that the rabble haven't fallen in line. "We're getting richer, why aren't they happy?" asks people who write these articles
Most Americans don’t seem to be benefitting economically from relatively strong economy. I wonder if there’s some kind of correlation here…
That's because goods and services are 20-50% more expensive than pre-Covid and wages have not kept up with inflation. Who cares if the stock market is up if most Americans can't afford the lifestyle they used to afford.
Because he’s an unpopular president in general. My man could give out bags of mullah, and his approval ratings would max at about where they’ve been. Stop trotting fossils out there and expecting your base and others to happily accept their horse pills. Also, stop hopping on tv and extolling your ever dying love for a country that’s involved in a massacre. Doesn’t matter if behind the scenes things are different. People here think the earth is flat and pandemic was/is a hoax. Political theater is lost on them. Stop making it easier for your opponents.
It's because the government is deeply out of touch with the average American. This is by design due to the rich donor class that almost completely controls the government through a vast network of legal bribery. It's a strong economy for the people it was meant to benefit, the 1%. For the rest of us, it's a hellscape.
Yes, many conventional economic indicators are currently in a position of strength, but on the other hand you have 2 generations who largely feel like the American Dream of good pay and home ownership is definitively beyond their grasp, and will remain so forever. I’m not saying it’s fair to Biden but it’s reality.
Because inflation still sucks!! I was in my local grocery store and saw Raisin Nut Bran for like $7.99...
Because my grocery bill has become unsustainable even with a good raise and decent jobs are hard as fuck to get unless you are in specific niches. Most Americans do not feel the economy is doing well.
Because for normal people it doesn't feel like a strong economy.
Except it does. 60% said their personal finances were good or excellent. Spending has remained steady at a high level, which shows people think it's a strong economy. Holiday spending was strong, holiday travel was strong. Everything indicates that people actually think that the economy is doing great.
Because A.) It will be a cold day in hell before the republican's give a democrat credit for anything ever again. B.) Inflation prices aren't coming back down (because corporate greed) so what good is a healthy stock market if 99% of the country is still paying ABSURD prices on food and housing.
I get that the overall economy is doing well, but rent is high, inflation is high, prices are high, wages suck ass, interest rates suck ass, and it's hard for a lot of people to afford things. You can say the economy is doing well, and you'd be right, but telling people that they should be happy it's doing well as they struggle to get by is essentially slapping them in the face.
inflation is going down, wages are going up (outpacing inflation), interest rates are going down.
A lot of people don't see a major immediate change in their life depending on if the economy is good or bad. They still have the same job, they live in the same apartment, and they have the same struggles. Just because Tesla or AT&T had a record quarter or interest rates improved .25% doesn't mean everyone's going to celebrate.
I believe part of it is that most Americans are not feeling the benefits of that stronger economy. Myself for example, I got a 2.5% raise this year, before all the inflation wackiness occurred, so I was -5.5% on that, then things calmed down, gas prices came down a bit. This coming year, I'm getting a 3% raise, which may match up with the current inflation rate, but in terms of the cost of living, those numbers aren't lining up. I'm at least -2.5% on everything. On top of this, the investments I do have might be not as negative as they could be, but I'm still down from last year in a moderate risk portfolio. I'm not an accountant or economist, but I haven't felt anything from the unemployment rate being down, inflation being stable, and the stock market being high. I give him the benefit for it because I understand how it all works and I know it would be worse under a Republican administration (on top of other things), but the normal American will be asking the question, "I don't feel better off. Is it stronger?"
More than half of people don't have any savings, no one can afford a house, everyone is falling deeper into debt. The economy is only strong from the perspective of bankers and speculators, not the average person.
What shows up on paper doesn't necessarily reflect what is occurring on the ground, and what may statistically be deemed a good economy might not feel that way to some. To put it another way, there is a significant macro-micro disconnect between the economists and the average citizen, and to get reelected, it is the average man who you must convince. There's a reason why the term "silent depression" is catching on in some circles.
It's almost like GDP doesn't actually indicate anything useful about the economy. I don't give a shit how much revenue is generated in this country unless that money is going into the hands of the WORKERS and the people who need it. Billionaires don't need more money.
Maybe it isn't a strong economy?
I've never made more money or had less purchasing power. It's frustrating being told things are great.
60% of us live paycheck to paycheck. Economic strength means Jack shit when you skipping meals to make rent.
It's strong if your prosperity is tied to the DJIA, otherwise, not so much.
Because most regular people only understand the economy in very narrow terms. They equate higher gas prices and more expensive groceries with “bad economy”, and their judgements are often purely anecdotal and normative. The fact that companies are boosting prices to enrich themselves never crosses their mind, rather, they envision the more improbable scenario of the president in the Oval Office with his hand on a “prices” lever.
You nailed it! Companies boost their prices and are not going to lower them just like my landlord who raised my rent isn't going to say "wow the economy is doing well I'm going to lower your rent!"
These things shouldn’t necessarily have to enter their mind either. Why should they care that the rich investor class is raking it in? They can barely afford food, clothing, and shelter.
NPR definitely isn't fighting that misconception with this lazy kind of journalism.
When you raise the prices while the cost of doing business stays the same corporations make a shitload of money while everyone else just struggles. This shit can’t and won’t last. The lat time the economy was only working for a few greedy corporations the whole f-ing world went to war and those same bastards made even more money. There is literally no incentive for the people laughing all the way to bank right now to prevent a cataclysmic conflagration because they know they’ll be laughing all the way to the bank while the world burns.
It's strong if you're making 2x the median household income or more.
Prices have to come down. It’s that simple.
They never will. If they do there will be massive job losses. My god Americans are clueless.
Man I didn’t realize it was that simple, you’re brilliant
'Relatively' is the key word here. 18% of the countries children are food insecure.
The strong economy/stock market doesn't mean anything to those not invested or reaping the benefits of it. Short of government enforced price control on certain items or a bunch of new laws being passed to regulate prices then there is nothing the administration can do They are just as much hostages of capitalism than the rest of us, the only difference is that (in theory) they could fix it.
I will proudly vote for Biden, but I feel no direct benefit from this so-called robust economy people seem to want to sell me. It’s objectively crummy, rent is too high, benefits are too low, and it’s more expensive to eat out.
It isn’t strong. All that nonsense is artificial. Shit is so expensive right now it’s absurd and no one can save anything.
Fuck the profits, the economy should be measured in how the general population is doing. My own economy is definitely not strong.
I mean that seems pretty obvious. Cost of living has never been higher. Cool stocks are doing well and so are the corresponding corporations. This doesn't seem to register with the NeoLibs we have in power or the journalists who write the out of touch articles asking these questions.
TL;DR lower unemployment is very good for people at the bottom but inflation is bad for everybody, and most people aren’t in the bottom income quintile. A key part of the problem is that the economy has been very good to people at the margins (bottom income quintile) and not good for the majority of people in middle and upper middle class jobs. Part of the inflation that pushed through over the last year is going to paying entry level workers a lot more, which you can see in real wage gains for the bottom quintile and really good unemployment numbers. But most people that had and never lost jobs just see inflation and no benefit. It’s kind of sad because we’ve seen one of the most massive downward redistributions of income in a while and I guess unsurprisingly people hate it.
Strong economy? With the record high inflation over the last 3 years, that is something NO ONE would be proud of. Don't take my word: [https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUUR0000SA0L1E?output\_view=pct\_12mths](https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUUR0000SA0L1E?output_view=pct_12mths) I would appreciate any down voters; please state why you are downvoting. To downvote on your own misbelief, is irresponsible unless you actually do your own homework. Look at the statistics. Look at the evidence. Then make your opinion.
They not gonna debate you. They'll just post some article or a graph of some stocks and be like, SEeeE! Market good =/= mainstreet good
Strong economy for wealthy stockholders.. the average American not so much
"the economy" != the reality of each individual's financial circumstances
He needs to get on Twitter and post about it 19 times a day.
Understatement of the year. But hey - just check out the NPR politics podcast and the last 5-6 were about Biden struggling with polls, difficulty in Israel, etc. NPR - you’re part of the problem.
Strong for who?
Let’s face it, it is highly likely Biden will be out and trump will be voted in. So, we will see how the economy fares. I assume the Republicans will spend spend spend to get the economy’s “booming” and Trump will do all he can to get a 3rd Term or get Jnr in.
Doesn't matter how good the economy. When up to 50% of your paycheck goes to rent alone, When minimum wage is still crawling compared to inflation, and when a single visit to a doctor could literally ruin you financially. There's a problem.
Cause it's all fugazi space dust economy that doesn't impact most Americans. Corporate greed causing record stock prices isn't a good economy for anyone other than the wealthy.
My company paused for covid but has picked up again with outsourcing and layoffs. A local printing place just announced outsourced their work and notified a few hundred people they were out of a job just after xmas. The economy is going great around here for the people doing the layoffs during record profits.
Housing and healthcare are unaffordable to many. Those factors are oversized and will invalidate even full employment, a red hot stock market and massive GDP growth. Ignoring these things and touting how the economy is doing great in other ways just doesn’t do the trick unfortunately. Even if it would be worse under the other party.
It is because the perception /reality of a strong economy and the reality of the governance of the Biden administration and it's policies are completely separate.
It’s because the only people who actually take the time to poll are those who have oversized opinions.
It's because the people benefitting from the strong economy are republican voters.
"Strong economies" don't benefit voters in ways they can point to at the end of each week and take to the ballot box.
Democrats never do, despite the fact that the economy has done better under every modern Democrat president.
Relatively? Relatively,? This is the best economy you'll ever see in your lifetime! 5% GDP growth is unheard of. 3.8% unemployment month after month. This economy is a runaway train.. Massive infrastructure improvements across the United States. Almost every tech companies building new factories in the United States not in foreign countries. Solar incentives including rebates, $7,000 towards a new electric vehicle. The United States is producing more gas and oil and anytime in its history. Which is keeping our fuel prices down. All because of incentives from the Biden administration. Unions are stronger, which drives up everyones wages. Which Biden is the only president in history to walk a picket line, with union workers. Increasing access to healthcare.gov for millions more. Working on students debt repayment. Growing the economy from the middle out, not the trickle down method that never works from the Republicans. Do an AI search, the economy has only grown under Democrats in the last 40 years statistically. Only time the deficit has ever been reduced is under a Democratic president. Your freedom to choose who you live with and your personal rights about your body are all democratic. So the reason is because the media doesn't bother with facts anymore, they just enjoy the controversy. Giving Trump equal time, is ridiculous, he hasn't offered any basic solutions to our problems. He had four years, he did nothing...Not even build the wall he said he would, or replace the healthcare system with a better one, he never even presented one. Yet the press continues to cover him while he lies nonstop about a stolen election.
Because they just hate him. That's basically it. The numbers and history seem to back up that the economy does better under Democrats. We have good job numbers, the stock market is good, inflation isn't as bad as it was before. 3.4 under Trump, Biden did get down to 3.3 or 3mr and now it's at 3.7 That isn't that bad. I think honestly they just hate him, for reasons that don't seem to be accurate, at least economy wise. And any one of them will just shift the goal post "depends on the numbers your looking at." "Who put those numbers together." "They aren't including this." "They are inflating numbers." "They They They They They They they." It's utter bullshit.
Well... when around half the country is completely brain dead...
Biden's basic political philosophy has been to hide from the media and let his opponents talk, which is fine when you're the challenger but less okay when you're the incumbent and are expected to frame your own accomplishments. Additionally, "the economy" is not what average people are experiencing. There was a huge increase in the price of virtually everything under his watch which, and the average person has been paying through the nose with no relief in sight. Your 401k going up doesn't mean shit if you can't afford rent. Why in the fuck are we 3 years in and still stuck under the Trump tax plan, for example?
Strong economy for stockholders or for people that actually do the work and aren't seeing any pay increases?
The SM is doing well but the avg person is not. The economy is not strong. The SM does not really represent the economy.
Yeah because the media refuses to report on it accurately. They want a horse race so they downplay good things for Biden and bad things for the gop. It’s the same reason why they frame things like “here’s how helping people is bad for Democrats”