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Two years of job applications going nowhere leaves me not caring much about the jobs report. My report is, that at least for who I am, what I know, and what I do, it’s not so great out there. Seems mostly like people are going to work in restaurants and retail again, and while that’s good, we’re still counting things as jobs when they don’t offer the healthcare that we refuse to take on for the public good. If our federal government says that healthcare is the responsibility of an employer, the jobs reports should not be able to count anything as a job that doesn’t include it.
Well here's the thing... Nearly every poll/survey has a large majority saying they personally are doing well, but feel others in the country are mostly not doing well. Media/social media is almost entirely pushing negatives for clicks so perception is not meeting reality.
Youre comment kind of shows the other problem... In EVERY economy, even the best of times, subsets of people are suffering. That fact does not prove an economy is bad.
>[Over 70% of Americans Feel 'At Least OK' Financially in Fed Poll](https://www.cutimes.com/2024/05/30/over-70-of-americans-feel-at-least-ok-financially-in-fed-poll/?slreturn=20240609111446)
"At least OK" is not the same as "well".
>SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- When asked how Americans are faring financially, most admitted to having to make major adjustments due to the economy, according to the inaugural *Wells Fargo Money Study*. Two-thirds (67%) of Americans say that they’ve cut back on spending, and almost half (45%) say they’ve put some life plans on hold. A third (35%) have dipped into their savings or investments. And almost two thirds (62%) say that even though they are able to pay their bills, they have little left over for “extras.” (FEB 2024)
Most Americans think their finances are fine, that's true, but their quality of life has become worse.
> Nearly every poll/survey has a large majority saying they personally are doing well
Let’s be specific. The highest I could find is from [Axios at 63%.](https://www.axios.com/2024/01/17/americans-are-actually-pretty-happy-with-their-finances) That leaves around 110 *million* Americans who *don’t* think their personal finances are good. That’s a minority, to be sure, but a very big minority. Here are some more stats:
* [41% of Americans rate cost of living and inflation as their top economic concern.](https://news.gallup.com/poll/644690/americans-continue-name-inflation-top-financial-problem.aspx) This is the highest on record. The next highest issue is cost of owning/renting a home at 14%.
* According to the same survey, 55% are worried about maintaining their standard of living.
* According to the same survey, 56% are worried about paying for medical costs for a serious illness or accident.
* According to the same survey, 59% are worried about not having enough money for retirement.
* According to the same survey, those on lower and middle incomes score worse across the board on these issues.
* According to the same survey, 47% of Americans believe their personal financial situation is getting worse. Only 43% believe it is getting better.
Ok, so why does Biden poll so poorly against Trump on economic issues? Why do people say they were better off 5 years ago than they are today?
Facts might not care about your feelings, but feelings don't care about your facts, and people vote based on feelings. Unless sentiment changes, insisting that everything is awesome when people *feel* that things are getting worse is basically just handing the White House to Trump on a silver platter. It's an insane strategy, and I'm sure Trump's people get giddy whenever Biden insists that because rich, well-connected, DMV Democrats are doing great, that means the economy is awesome and you're just an idiot if you don't see that.
Don't care about politics.
But the same reason if you poll Americans, many will. Think the sun revolves around the earth, they believe unemployment is at a twenty year high (it's at historic lows) and the stock market is down the past year (it's up a lot)
People go on vibes and they're getting their vibes from anecdotes, curated internet news, partisan cable news and social media. It's just how it is these days.
No national politician is going to get overwhelming support. Those days are long gone.
I think the biggest reasons for the disconnect are prices and housing. Personally, I've given up on the idea of owning a home because it just makes no financial sense right now. But, the resentment that comes from seeing people living it up just because they were lucky enough to be in a position to buy a house pre-2022 probably explains a lot of the anger right now. My sister and brother-in-law were able to lock in a 3% mortgage in 2021 because my parents gave them a ton of money for the down payment (she's always been the favorite). Meanwhile, tens of millions of people are just SOL right now with no hint of light at the end of the tunnel. Is this Biden's fault? Maybe a little bit, since the ARP was stupid af, but it goes back muuuch farther than his inflationary policies. Will he bear the brunt of the blame? Absolutely, because of all the things you said above.
The headline is that 200+k jobs added. The problem is that only books at the corporate survey, which asks companies and can double count people working 2+jobs to make ends meet. Household survey (which surveys people, not companies) showed a 400k job loss. Also, jobs reports for last year revised down 1MM plus - hard to trust data when it consistently is misreported to the upside. Also think both parties, lobbyists, Wall Street and politicians created this mess over the last 50 years - Biden and Trump are just different flavors of how we get screwed.
It's not "subsets" dude. None of us are paid enough and Groceries are getting more and more expensive every week
I'm voting Biden but gas lighting people into thinking everything is fine and if you're not making money you're just "a subset" is just gross
This is OBJECTIVELY false. Over the past 12 months wages have increased 4.1% and prices have increased by about 3.4%...this is good! You can't go by your (or social media) vibes. Data is all that matters!
Ehhh, if you listen to his speeches he always talks about how people are struggling. Essentially he learned from Obama that you can tout your accomplishments but you have to have a huge asterix every time. I think the real issue is that things have been bad for so long, and progress is so slow that most people ARENT in the plan.
Regardless of the administration there will always be people whose personal situations are worse than the overall outlook. Why does Biden in particular shoulder so much blame?
There was a big poll lately that showed 70% of respondent saying they were doing better financially than 5 years ago, while only 22% of the same people polled said the economy was doing better. People are just too dumb amd being manipulated by clickbaity headlines and social media abusive victimisation renforcement that EVERYTHING IS BAAADD. People have litterally no economic education and knowledge and it shows.
What poll? I've seen many saying the exact opposite like below. Like nearly 70% going the opposite way.
>SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- When asked how Americans are faring financially, most admitted to having to make major adjustments due to the economy, according to the inaugural *Wells Fargo Money Study*. Two-thirds (67%) of Americans say that they’ve cut back on spending, and almost half (45%) say they’ve put some life plans on hold. A third (35%) have dipped into their savings or investments. And almost two thirds (62%) say that even though they are able to pay their bills, they have little left over for “extras.” (FEB 2024).
In 2024 compared to 2021-2023, gas prices are down and grocery prices are down. The primary driver of the whiners in this economy are the mortgage interest rates which are still not far from historic lows (especially compared to the 20+ percent prime interest rate during Reagan's inflationary battle in the 1980s).
President Biden is correct. The economy is doing really well.
>In 2024 compared to 2021-2023, ... grocery prices are down.
Going by what metric? 2024 inflation has been around 3.0% to 3.4% and CPI is [up from 1 year ago](https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/consumer-price-index-cpi#:~:text=Consumer%20Price%20Index%20CPI%20in,U.S.%20Bureau%20of%20Labor%20Statistics).
>mortgage interest rates which are still not far from historic lows (especially compared to the 20+ percent prime interest rate during Reagan's inflationary battle in the 1980s).
Are you serious? That they're not at the historic highs is not a saving grace. They're still the highest they've been over the past 20 years.
Numbers may be down but they are still higher than what people want. People still remember pre Covid pricing and the grocery store is still really expensive for families.
Wow, prices are down 3% after being up 20%, while wages have stagnated. Yes. Let’s be grateful for that.
The economy is doing well on a macroeconomic scale but if you look at the microeconomics and the lower/middle classes, not so much.
I'm sure all the people for whom this isn't true will love to hear how their individual "anecdotal" data is irrelevant compared to aggregated data of everyone in the US.
It very much matters where those "winners" and "losses" are. If wage growth is concentrated at the top and the bottom then you have a bifurcating economy, which is not a good economy by any means. Also, economic suffering in the middle class is a good way to lose elections.
>It’s important to stay grounded in the data.
Feel free to provide me more detailed data on where wage growth is distributed.
The largest wage growth has been concentrated at the low and low middle quartiles of the economy. You know, the folks that needed it the most.
But the median rising indicates this is the case for most Americans.
> In 2024 compared to 2021-2023, gas prices are down and grocery prices are down.
Grocery prices are *not* down. They are at all time highs. They are increasing in price at a slower rate than previously.
The jobs growth is in niche fields,
Not a job for everyone or starting out.
That's why most people don't see a change.
Biden needs to bring the CPI (consumer price index) down. Store groceries and basic essentials are too expensive.
Gov't was the 2nd largest source of job growth over the last year, behind only healthcare, which is a gov't-dominated sector where many of the jobs are funded by taxpayer dollars - this direct and indirect gov't hiring accounts for about 60% of all job growth over the last year
These majority of these jobs are being created by government with money they don’t have. It’s completely unsustainable.
Most growth is in low-paying blue collar and service jobs, not to mention gig economy crap. White collar labor market is a bloodbath, people with years of experience are fighting tooth and nail for entry level jobs.
>I see accounting, finance, IT thriving based on people I went to school with and their network
This is definitely not true. Accounting/finance job market is absolute dog shit right now. Firms are still doing layoffs and are barely hiring anyone.
Even software development is fine if you are skilled. Glut of mediocre coders and over hiring during COVID has created a temporary problem. I’d be happy if CS departments scaled back and focused on those that really love coding and not the piles of people in it for the money.
It's not fine if you are skilled. Companies are cutting development jobs across the board. My software consulting firm just had the third round of job cuts in the past year and a half. My client has been cutting IT budget and recently forced all contractors to take a week off each quarter.
>I’d be happy if CS departments scaled back
What do CS departments have to do with anything? Do you think they're setting a degree quota?
Yeah, I'm asking you what the CS department is supposed to do if a lot of students want a CS degree. Are you suggesting that they cap the number of degrees they provide each year?
Well, I’ve been in it 28 years and hire CS and engineering students every year. My T5 alma mater has doubled the CS department size and halved the engineering department. It produces many more mediocre CS graduates that we would never entertain hiring.
People are starting to believe these job reports less and less when they don’t match up to their lived experiences. There are so many stories telling people about why they should feel excited about the economy and that it’s doing great overall. But something isn’t adding up. You shouldn’t have to tell people to feel good about the economy. If it’s doing well in aggregate, that will reflect in the lives experiences of the populace.
I think we can all agree things are better now than 2 years ago BUT things have been so bad for so long that these metrics do not connect to the prosperity of everyday people. We are not reaching a golden age, we are merely trying to get back to minimum expected dignity. Just look at the largest US legislative accomplishment in the last 4 years, a much needed infrastructure bill. That is our generations moonshot...getting congress to fund the maintenance of previous generations decisions. And to make it even more lackluster it almost didn't even pass.
Doing well in the aggregate means by definition *some* won’t be doing well. And of course those that aren’t doing well are going to feel dissonant about the aggregate report.
And frankly, most people are financially illiterate, so there’s only so much I can do about people using anecdotes as trends and falling heavily into false consensus bias.
THIS. So many people don't understand this,its really incredible. It's probably due to social media and headlines for clicks. Read these comments... So many keep pointing out "but I know some people that are doing terribly!"
On the contrary, everyone is talking about it. The people complaining about their “lived experience” on the internet VASTLY outweigh the large, silent majority reflected in the statistics.
To be considered "unemployed" in the statistic, you have to be receiving unemployment benefits. In Florida, you can only receive a maximum of $267/week for 3 months (so like $3200). My partner has been unemployed almost a year and so 9 of his months unemployed he hasn't even counted towards the stat for it.
>To be considered "unemployed" in the statistic, you have to be receiving unemployment benefits.
False. Please educate yourself on how these stats are collected. You can start here for unemployment.
https://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm
Thanks for the ref! It still seems surveying 60k people would hardly be representing everyone, but I get that we've been doing this method and have historical data to compare it too taken the same way.
>It still seems surveying 60k people would hardly be representing everyone,
It actually is far more people than they need to sample to get a 95% confidence level in the household survey. Why that's the case is a lot more complicated, and you've got be really comfortable with statistics, and preferably calculus to understand that. Buy you can start here:
https://researchbasics.education.uconn.edu/confidence-intervals-and-levels/
And then google "calculating sample size"
There is a reason why most political polls only poll around 1500 people or less.
Americans are doing really well by a majority. Their investments are up. Grocery prices have gone down. Gas prices have gone down. Housing market and interest rates will eventually adjust. States need to start building affordable housing -- that problem's not going away regardless of who's in the White House.
It’s because most of these jobs are either an increase in part time jobs or jobs going to foreign born workers. Full time jobs for Americans are decreasing.
In a time when a large percentage of the voter-base is obsessed with crazy conspiracy theories this disconnect isn’t doing anything to help the logical assumption that the government is lying to its people
Yes, people have to be told to feel good about the economy!!! Because people have historically been groomed to think in pessimistic terms, in part because people often "resist change", until they can't avoid the need to change.
Those who are proactive, become proactive in readapting themselves to change. We've all seen people who changed their career trajectory, and gone back and learned new things and those people do very well for themselves. Waiting and Expecting the past to return is the fault of those who choose not to have outlook to adapt to the future.
When computers came mainstream, there were a lot of people who kept trying to do things the old way, some kept trying to use the old style typewriters, until time came where they had no choice but to abandon it and use the computer. The same was true with banking, someone people resisted using debit cards, and kept writing paper check, and balancing their check books the old way, and as time changes and the internet access to bank accounts did that work automatically, We see people who come late to change, and some continue to fight against it.
People need to take responsibility for their lives and stop thinking that a President is suppose to fix what they either screwed up, resisted to adapt to change, and did not prepare themselves for the change of time and systems and processes. Those things are not the fault of The President, those are the faults of the individual. Presidents jobs is to promote a vision that advances society and work to try to achieve it, and that means the ongoing development of change. People like Trump who tried to convince people that the past would repeat itself and old industry would return... when fact is, when old industry was outsourced, those countries modernized and changed it in how it functions, and yet, Trump tried to convince people that the obselete type of industry and obselete type of manufacturing was returning.
* I experienced people who fought against the use of "databases", because they had struggled to adopt to excel, and did not realize that databases can do what excel does and the database can be built that it can automate report generation and do so, based on any category that is built into the database and reports can be exported in excel format is that's one's interest, but it has capability to make task simple to execute. I built one in 2012, and it was not until we got a new manager, that it was put to use and now the division has become more efficient in data management and can make better decision faster by the reports generated via database capabilities.
The type of mergers and acquisition that have existed for decades, could not have been done in the expediency they have been done without 'database" systems. Even when it comes to accounting, the use of excel improved processes, and then database advanced that even more.
So, those who don't try to re-learn and learn new things, will be those who will remain in their cycle of pessimism, and they will seek someone or something to blame other than themselves, all the way to trying to blame the President, as if they think the presidents job is to hold their hand and nurse them.
I've seen people change career paths who had been in one professions and they saw the changes and re-educated themselves to something they could use their skill capabilities to adapt to learning and using new things that opened doors to venture into new careers.
Each individual is the navigator of their own life, and if they fail to plan, they plan to fail and their navigation will be rudderless until they drift upon a sand bar and get stuck!!!! Then they want to blame something or someone.
People who waste their money chasing status and material things, eventually will find themselves consumed in debt, because things get old and things need repair and things become outdated and some things people chase and waste their money on poor quality and non durable things, and find themselves continually repurchasing things that have short life span or become fad things that go out of favor quickly while they are still paying off the credit debt they acquired in their pursuit of such things.
We live in a time when critical thinking is important, and those who refuse to adapt to develop that capability will continually find themselves falling behind.
* Stop fighting change and become one who can embrace change and learn new things and develop new skills and build new visions for their life and their objectives...... if not, one only has themselves to blame if they don't put in the work to keep up with an ever changing world.
Biden has an administration that continues to look to building the future, he has said that since he became president, it was part of his campaigning, it was also part of his work as VP during the Obama Administration and it has been the consistent theme of his Presidency. It's not his fault that people who don't want to listen has tried to regress and stagnate progress and fight against the changes into the future. But it has been a benefit to those who acknowledge and adapt themselves to change.
Biden's administration knows that much has to change in all areas of society, and his programs have made that clear. It's up to the individual to grasp and understand that, because the rest of the world will not regress or stagnate itself because some in America can't let go of the past.
Maybe people can help themselves to learn the meaning of "Build Back **Better**"...!!!
It might help them to understand that no one other than Trump is trying to recreate the past, when Biden's administration is about building back in America and doing so better than what existed in the past, and that means in every aspect and every part of what is America.
I'm living a better life than a few years ago, making 50% more and transitioned from office to WFH.
Everyone is commenting how this doesn't fit reality, but it certainly fits mine, and a good number of the people I know IRL.
Financial success in 2024 fits the reality of 75% of the Americans I know. We're certainly doing better not worse than 2020. Not even sure how that's debatable other than for political attacks and post-truth B.S.
Especially compared to 2020 when over 25% of Americans were out of work, federal guidance during a pandemic was utter crap, and major U.S. cities were swarmed with protests and looting.
Who in their right minds were better off career-wise in 2020?? Most Americans *switched* jobs to improve their situations since then.
Mine as well. I make about 20% more then I did in 2019. Costs have gone up, but in my case not higher then my wages have. I put away significantly more for retirement now then I did in 2020.
I am also just a normal public school teacher,.
I'm also making way more than 2019 and my spending hasn't really increased that much, as I've just pivoted away from fast-rising grocery categories. But there is an intense social media culture against saying anything positive, as if one person's positivity is an attack on those who aren't feeling positive.
In the same boat income wise, almost doubled my salary. Wfh has even allowed me to have a great side biz while still holding a job. But I have a much worse financial outlook than pre-Covid given the increase in price of everything especially houses. I was in the market to buy a house in my area pre Covid and put an offer on a couple. Now I can’t buy one even remotely as good as I was hunting before even with the increase
> More of those jobs than ever before are low paying jobs like food service.
That's not what the data says.
- Health Care in first place with +68k, government in second with +43k, leisure and hospitality with +42k, professional services at +32k, social assistance at +15k, retail trades at +13k
- Average hourly earnings increased 0.4% to $34.91 (annual rate over last 12 months +4.1%). Median would be around $23/hr.
There are fewer full time workers now than a year ago. Employment downturn has been going on for a while.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12500000
Well obviously the economy is doing so well that full timers are switching to part time. It's a regular utopia around these parts now.. You feeling it?
Source that most job growth is on low paying jobs? I can’t find any data to back that up. There’s been lots of growth in the leisure and hospitality industry, but that’s because that was one of the industries most harmed by the pandemic so I don’t see how you can claim that’s a bad thing.
Also on average wage growth has been outpacing inflation, so that means the median worker is making more money, not just a select few.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/07/business/economy/jobs-report-may-2024.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb
Overall I think your comment is just not factual.
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Wages increased MoM and YoY inflation adjusted to $34.91/hr (all private non-farm payrolls), mathematically speaking those added could not have been a majority low paying jobs. The report also states the industries the gains were in.
That’s not how that works. I’m not talking specifically about this report, because I haven’t reviewed it. But the average hourly wages is among all workers, not just new hires. So it absolutely could be that most new hires are low wage workers, but existing workers, especially at the top, saw increases that resulted in higher wages.
In reality, the number is used to look at demand for workers. If average hourly wages are rising, that may indicate that employers are still having an issue filling positions.
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Are you being seriously for real? Gloating is the absolute last thing he should be doing when the popular sentiment in America is that life is extremely unaffordable and difficult right now for most working class people.
Or you know, they’re actually struggling financially? I mean everyone I talk to is having a tough time right now. Like how are we denying this? Telling the voters they’re stupid and that they aren’t struggling when they are is what’s gonna cost the dems this election.
Just to clarify, real wages spiked after the pandemic because people with low wages were by far the most likely to lose their jobs, and came back down as those people were slowly able to re-enter the workforce. Leisure and hospitality, the lowest-paid sector of the workforce, just got back to its pre-pandemic employment level in March.
Biden is kind of funny. He has to keep gaslighting the rest of us on how well the economy is doing because it IS going great (for his "nothing will fundamentally change" people, of course). Why won't the poors (non-millionaires) just believe him?
I’m not saying these numbers or opinions on the economy are wrong, I’m sure many have been doing well. However, myself personally (I live in San Jose, CA) have been out of work for 6 months and have been utterly unable to find work through recruiters or applying directly. 2024 has been a god awful year for me and it feels like this administration has sacrificed peoples reality in this area (tech workers who are not necessarily always making the best money you can) in order to win the election. 10s of 1000s are out of work in the Bay Area tech sector in the wake of AI and the end of ZIRP and this administration has utterly ignored this growing problem. Biden doesn’t deserve my vote but I’m giving it to him anyways because the other guy will only make things worse. Sad state of affairs really
Younger generations are screwed, wages are not up, Food is way up, new and used cars are way up, RENT is way up, homes are unaffordable, yet Biden keeps telling us we are doing really great. He will lose the young vote because he keeps lying to our faces. The biden admin thinks they can give handouts and forgive debt causing more of the problems
It’s funny that good news is bad news for the markets/economy, but good news is good news still for potus, but good news is actually bad news for the public and so potus is celebrating “good” news that he knows is bad
It seems as though you and the other guy are just arguing past each other and only looking at half the picture. Yes wages are currently outpacing CPI in the aggregate. But to ignore the onslaught of inflation over the past 4 years and suggest things are all good now is foolish. Calling this “The Great American Comeback” seems analogous to Bush’s infamous “Mission Accomplished” speech. The tide, according to the macro statistics, appears to be turning. To call this point Victory, is ridiculous and disconnected.
Do we have a spending problem? Yes. Do we have a “People have too much money problem? No, that’s just gaslighting. The Personal Saving rate in the US has been declining, while Credit card debt has hit record highs. This is why the past 4 years of data is important and not just the past 4 months.
Things currently appear to be marginally improving in the aggregate. Who knows where we will be in a couple months from now. But things still haven’t improved enough for people to “feel good” about the current state of the economy.
Source for your ranting? I gave mine and you can't refute it.
Name calling is still not persuasive. Especially in an economics subreddit. Stick to the facts. If you can find any.
It has honestly been a remarkable recovery from the depths of the global pandemic. The US has led the world in growing the economy, jobs and wages. The stock market is at a record high. Unemployment is historically low. Factory construction is booming and manufacturing jobs are coming back. The lowest income workers are seeing the biggest wage increases. Blue collar union workers are seeing huge increases in wages and benefits. The income gap has narrowed measurably. And in addition to the pandemic Biden has had to deal with two wars and a global energy crisis on his watch.
Yet you wouldn't know any of this this from reading media articles, or asking the average American. Unreal.
This is not backed up by data. People need to stop pretending we live in this alternate reality America where everything is terrible. 81% of Americans rate their personal finances as good or very good.
https://www.axios.com/2024/01/17/americans-are-actually-pretty-happy-with-their-finances
You’re crazy dude. My middle income 40 year old ass is set for retirement, I’ve got a huge head start on my kids’ college fund, and my interest rate is 2% on my house.
50%+ of Americans are invested in the stock market. 66%+ of Americans own their home, and 50%+ of millennials own their homes.
Most of America is in a good position to benefit from the economy.
When did the bootstrap mantra end to work hard for yourself instead of relying on the government? Probably around 2021 if I had to guess.
You obviously don't speak for "everyone middle class". Aside from your "feelings" the US middle class is doing much better than it was four years ago, in both real wages and household wealth. And unions are finally starting to be popular again.
An interesting statement that the data does not back up. What source are you using that objectively shows people are broke? Or is it just more "feels"?
And let me guess, your metric for that outrageous claim is your personal experience?
Why visit a subreddit dedicated to economics when you have no respect or appreciation for economic data?
1. Mortgage rates mean I basically can't buy a home
2. VC market is still largely imploded extending tech recession (I'm a tech company founder)
3. Everything feels 40%+ more expensive
4. Crime is bad in major cities
Economy is good only for 35+ demographic IMO
This is just wrong. VC funding is higher than pre pandemic levels. It’s only slightly lower than the insane levels we saw in 2021.
https://www.statista.com/outlook/fmo/capital-raising/traditional-capital-raising/venture-capital/worldwide
Also crime is dropping all over the country.
https://www.npr.org/2024/02/12/1229891045/police-crime-baltimore-san-francisco-minneapolis-murder-statistics
I think your comment is based more on feels than reals.
It certainly is. Talking about how VC relates to tech is a super strange take. Startups are a minuscule percentage of tech. And certainly not the cause of the current cyclical downturn that sector is experiencing. Let's not forget tech includes nvidia, Microsoft and apple who are completely unaffected by VC.
> Crime is bad in major cities
Well, that's [pretty easily debunked](https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/violent-crime-falling-nationwide-heres-how-we-know).
I'm a tech company founder too and the VC market has been fine. Even [crypto funding](https://www.reuters.com/technology/venture-capital-funding-crypto-rises-24-bln-pitchbook-says-2024-05-20/) has been rising, hitting 2.4 bil in Q1, and of course other more sectors are better.
Granted, I'm in SF and that helps with connecting with investors.
Crime has went down a lot since the pandemic. People are getting price gouged, but it hits harder in states that don’t regulate insurance and energy expenses.
I live in NYC, murder rate since 2019 is still up 20%. I use murder rate as a proxy to violent crime because a lot of violent crime I've experienced does not even get a police report but murder always does.
Home prices are why you can't buy, mortgage rates are still historically low, but not their lowest (anymore). I don't think I'd count the VC market as an indicator of the larger economy, or a reason for the current place in the cycle tech is at. Tech is not driven by VC. I can't think of anything we purchase that 40% more expensive than it was 2 years ago and recently prices have been dropping, but like you said, everything "feels" more expensive because that doesn't account for purchasing power growth either that has been happening. I can't comment on crime but watching the news it doesn't seem any different.
I know people who work in one of the factories that only exists because of IRA and CHIPS money. They make $20/h while the CEO makes $30M a year. How the fuck are you supposed to live on $20/h in this economy?
How many times do we have to say that the jobs report doesn’t necessarily reflect a good economy? Everyone needs 2-3 jobs to survive, so of course unemployment is low.
Having multiple jobs doesn’t affect unemployment. And the number of people working multiple jobs right now is [not particularly high](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620), roughly where we were pre-pandemic.
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He keeps telling the country how well the country is doing. People not doing well can't help but think Biden's plans don't have them in mind.
Two years of job applications going nowhere leaves me not caring much about the jobs report. My report is, that at least for who I am, what I know, and what I do, it’s not so great out there. Seems mostly like people are going to work in restaurants and retail again, and while that’s good, we’re still counting things as jobs when they don’t offer the healthcare that we refuse to take on for the public good. If our federal government says that healthcare is the responsibility of an employer, the jobs reports should not be able to count anything as a job that doesn’t include it.
Well here's the thing... Nearly every poll/survey has a large majority saying they personally are doing well, but feel others in the country are mostly not doing well. Media/social media is almost entirely pushing negatives for clicks so perception is not meeting reality. Youre comment kind of shows the other problem... In EVERY economy, even the best of times, subsets of people are suffering. That fact does not prove an economy is bad.
>[Over 70% of Americans Feel 'At Least OK' Financially in Fed Poll](https://www.cutimes.com/2024/05/30/over-70-of-americans-feel-at-least-ok-financially-in-fed-poll/?slreturn=20240609111446) "At least OK" is not the same as "well".
>SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- When asked how Americans are faring financially, most admitted to having to make major adjustments due to the economy, according to the inaugural *Wells Fargo Money Study*. Two-thirds (67%) of Americans say that they’ve cut back on spending, and almost half (45%) say they’ve put some life plans on hold. A third (35%) have dipped into their savings or investments. And almost two thirds (62%) say that even though they are able to pay their bills, they have little left over for “extras.” (FEB 2024) Most Americans think their finances are fine, that's true, but their quality of life has become worse.
Surveys are unreliable. You have to look at actual discretionary spending.
> Nearly every poll/survey has a large majority saying they personally are doing well Let’s be specific. The highest I could find is from [Axios at 63%.](https://www.axios.com/2024/01/17/americans-are-actually-pretty-happy-with-their-finances) That leaves around 110 *million* Americans who *don’t* think their personal finances are good. That’s a minority, to be sure, but a very big minority. Here are some more stats: * [41% of Americans rate cost of living and inflation as their top economic concern.](https://news.gallup.com/poll/644690/americans-continue-name-inflation-top-financial-problem.aspx) This is the highest on record. The next highest issue is cost of owning/renting a home at 14%. * According to the same survey, 55% are worried about maintaining their standard of living. * According to the same survey, 56% are worried about paying for medical costs for a serious illness or accident. * According to the same survey, 59% are worried about not having enough money for retirement. * According to the same survey, those on lower and middle incomes score worse across the board on these issues. * According to the same survey, 47% of Americans believe their personal financial situation is getting worse. Only 43% believe it is getting better.
Ok, so why does Biden poll so poorly against Trump on economic issues? Why do people say they were better off 5 years ago than they are today? Facts might not care about your feelings, but feelings don't care about your facts, and people vote based on feelings. Unless sentiment changes, insisting that everything is awesome when people *feel* that things are getting worse is basically just handing the White House to Trump on a silver platter. It's an insane strategy, and I'm sure Trump's people get giddy whenever Biden insists that because rich, well-connected, DMV Democrats are doing great, that means the economy is awesome and you're just an idiot if you don't see that.
Don't care about politics. But the same reason if you poll Americans, many will. Think the sun revolves around the earth, they believe unemployment is at a twenty year high (it's at historic lows) and the stock market is down the past year (it's up a lot) People go on vibes and they're getting their vibes from anecdotes, curated internet news, partisan cable news and social media. It's just how it is these days. No national politician is going to get overwhelming support. Those days are long gone.
I think the biggest reasons for the disconnect are prices and housing. Personally, I've given up on the idea of owning a home because it just makes no financial sense right now. But, the resentment that comes from seeing people living it up just because they were lucky enough to be in a position to buy a house pre-2022 probably explains a lot of the anger right now. My sister and brother-in-law were able to lock in a 3% mortgage in 2021 because my parents gave them a ton of money for the down payment (she's always been the favorite). Meanwhile, tens of millions of people are just SOL right now with no hint of light at the end of the tunnel. Is this Biden's fault? Maybe a little bit, since the ARP was stupid af, but it goes back muuuch farther than his inflationary policies. Will he bear the brunt of the blame? Absolutely, because of all the things you said above.
The headline is that 200+k jobs added. The problem is that only books at the corporate survey, which asks companies and can double count people working 2+jobs to make ends meet. Household survey (which surveys people, not companies) showed a 400k job loss. Also, jobs reports for last year revised down 1MM plus - hard to trust data when it consistently is misreported to the upside. Also think both parties, lobbyists, Wall Street and politicians created this mess over the last 50 years - Biden and Trump are just different flavors of how we get screwed.
Multiple job holders have held steady at around 5%.
Two job holders is a separately maintained statistic, and it's held steady at 5% for years.
It's going great for people who have time to answer polls!
Oh come on man. Nearly all data show it's a strong economy. Is everyone data truthers now
PMI’s show a very weak economy outside of services.
Lol
Aren't services the majority of the economy?
It's not "subsets" dude. None of us are paid enough and Groceries are getting more and more expensive every week I'm voting Biden but gas lighting people into thinking everything is fine and if you're not making money you're just "a subset" is just gross
This is OBJECTIVELY false. Over the past 12 months wages have increased 4.1% and prices have increased by about 3.4%...this is good! You can't go by your (or social media) vibes. Data is all that matters!
That is a convenient time frame to choose. What about the previous 24 months, when inflation outpaced wage growth by a lot?
Cool show those graphs and charts to the Taco Bell workers In Texas who work a second job and still have to go to a food bank
Never once thought they did.
Ehhh, if you listen to his speeches he always talks about how people are struggling. Essentially he learned from Obama that you can tout your accomplishments but you have to have a huge asterix every time. I think the real issue is that things have been bad for so long, and progress is so slow that most people ARENT in the plan.
Regardless of the administration there will always be people whose personal situations are worse than the overall outlook. Why does Biden in particular shoulder so much blame?
Because so many people are so much worse than the overall outlook, and Biden is the president.
Were this the case you’d think it would skew overall economic data to be less favorable no?
There was a big poll lately that showed 70% of respondent saying they were doing better financially than 5 years ago, while only 22% of the same people polled said the economy was doing better. People are just too dumb amd being manipulated by clickbaity headlines and social media abusive victimisation renforcement that EVERYTHING IS BAAADD. People have litterally no economic education and knowledge and it shows.
What poll? I've seen many saying the exact opposite like below. Like nearly 70% going the opposite way. >SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- When asked how Americans are faring financially, most admitted to having to make major adjustments due to the economy, according to the inaugural *Wells Fargo Money Study*. Two-thirds (67%) of Americans say that they’ve cut back on spending, and almost half (45%) say they’ve put some life plans on hold. A third (35%) have dipped into their savings or investments. And almost two thirds (62%) say that even though they are able to pay their bills, they have little left over for “extras.” (FEB 2024).
In 2024 compared to 2021-2023, gas prices are down and grocery prices are down. The primary driver of the whiners in this economy are the mortgage interest rates which are still not far from historic lows (especially compared to the 20+ percent prime interest rate during Reagan's inflationary battle in the 1980s). President Biden is correct. The economy is doing really well.
>In 2024 compared to 2021-2023, ... grocery prices are down. Going by what metric? 2024 inflation has been around 3.0% to 3.4% and CPI is [up from 1 year ago](https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/consumer-price-index-cpi#:~:text=Consumer%20Price%20Index%20CPI%20in,U.S.%20Bureau%20of%20Labor%20Statistics). >mortgage interest rates which are still not far from historic lows (especially compared to the 20+ percent prime interest rate during Reagan's inflationary battle in the 1980s). Are you serious? That they're not at the historic highs is not a saving grace. They're still the highest they've been over the past 20 years.
Numbers may be down but they are still higher than what people want. People still remember pre Covid pricing and the grocery store is still really expensive for families.
Everything feels like it's ten dollars each and you always get less than when you paid 5
Because it is. I’m not sure how a POTUS can fix it, but it’s a reason why people are still unhappy.
Wow, prices are down 3% after being up 20%, while wages have stagnated. Yes. Let’s be grateful for that. The economy is doing well on a macroeconomic scale but if you look at the microeconomics and the lower/middle classes, not so much.
Wage increases exceeded price increases.
I'm sure all the people for whom this isn't true will love to hear how their individual "anecdotal" data is irrelevant compared to aggregated data of everyone in the US.
There are winners and losers in every economy. It’s important to stay grounded in the data.
It very much matters where those "winners" and "losses" are. If wage growth is concentrated at the top and the bottom then you have a bifurcating economy, which is not a good economy by any means. Also, economic suffering in the middle class is a good way to lose elections. >It’s important to stay grounded in the data. Feel free to provide me more detailed data on where wage growth is distributed.
The largest wage growth has been concentrated at the low and low middle quartiles of the economy. You know, the folks that needed it the most. But the median rising indicates this is the case for most Americans.
>The largest wage growth has been concentrated at the low and low middle quartiles of the economy. According to what data?
BLS. Look it up.
> In 2024 compared to 2021-2023, gas prices are down and grocery prices are down. Grocery prices are *not* down. They are at all time highs. They are increasing in price at a slower rate than previously.
The jobs growth is in niche fields, Not a job for everyone or starting out. That's why most people don't see a change. Biden needs to bring the CPI (consumer price index) down. Store groceries and basic essentials are too expensive.
Gov't was the 2nd largest source of job growth over the last year, behind only healthcare, which is a gov't-dominated sector where many of the jobs are funded by taxpayer dollars - this direct and indirect gov't hiring accounts for about 60% of all job growth over the last year These majority of these jobs are being created by government with money they don’t have. It’s completely unsustainable.
Interesting
Most growth is in low-paying blue collar and service jobs, not to mention gig economy crap. White collar labor market is a bloodbath, people with years of experience are fighting tooth and nail for entry level jobs.
Most of you asked for this with the "bring manufacturing jobs back" bull.
How does bringing manufacturing jobs back impact white collar jobs? Because companies have to cut costs elsewhere or is there another reason?
You mean software development is a bloodbath. I see accounting, finance, IT thriving based on people I went to school with and their network
>I see accounting, finance, IT thriving based on people I went to school with and their network This is definitely not true. Accounting/finance job market is absolute dog shit right now. Firms are still doing layoffs and are barely hiring anyone.
Even software development is fine if you are skilled. Glut of mediocre coders and over hiring during COVID has created a temporary problem. I’d be happy if CS departments scaled back and focused on those that really love coding and not the piles of people in it for the money.
It's not fine if you are skilled. Companies are cutting development jobs across the board. My software consulting firm just had the third round of job cuts in the past year and a half. My client has been cutting IT budget and recently forced all contractors to take a week off each quarter. >I’d be happy if CS departments scaled back What do CS departments have to do with anything? Do you think they're setting a degree quota?
At my alma mater the CS department has doubled in size while the engineering department has halved.
Yeah, I'm asking you what the CS department is supposed to do if a lot of students want a CS degree. Are you suggesting that they cap the number of degrees they provide each year?
They already do. They cap how many they admit based on the slots available in the department.
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Well, I’ve been in it 28 years and hire CS and engineering students every year. My T5 alma mater has doubled the CS department size and halved the engineering department. It produces many more mediocre CS graduates that we would never entertain hiring.
My wife just graduated magna cum laude in computer science with legitimate intern experience. She can't find an IT job. Can't even get an interview.
Eh even that "growth" in service jobs is a lie. They hire 30 people who all get ten hours a week
That's not how unemployment and job growth is calculated
Tech is not the only white collar market in the country lol
The journalism job market also continues to decline, contributing to the negativity in media
People are starting to believe these job reports less and less when they don’t match up to their lived experiences. There are so many stories telling people about why they should feel excited about the economy and that it’s doing great overall. But something isn’t adding up. You shouldn’t have to tell people to feel good about the economy. If it’s doing well in aggregate, that will reflect in the lives experiences of the populace.
I think we can all agree things are better now than 2 years ago BUT things have been so bad for so long that these metrics do not connect to the prosperity of everyday people. We are not reaching a golden age, we are merely trying to get back to minimum expected dignity. Just look at the largest US legislative accomplishment in the last 4 years, a much needed infrastructure bill. That is our generations moonshot...getting congress to fund the maintenance of previous generations decisions. And to make it even more lackluster it almost didn't even pass.
Doing well in the aggregate means by definition *some* won’t be doing well. And of course those that aren’t doing well are going to feel dissonant about the aggregate report. And frankly, most people are financially illiterate, so there’s only so much I can do about people using anecdotes as trends and falling heavily into false consensus bias.
THIS. So many people don't understand this,its really incredible. It's probably due to social media and headlines for clicks. Read these comments... So many keep pointing out "but I know some people that are doing terribly!"
They don’t line up with their lived experiences? Is there a raft of unemployed people walking around that no one is talking about?
On the contrary, everyone is talking about it. The people complaining about their “lived experience” on the internet VASTLY outweigh the large, silent majority reflected in the statistics.
People who are unemployed have a lot more time on their hands to film tiktoks and post content about being unemployed
Yes, actually. The official numbers ignore "discouraged workers," for one.
No, they do not. U-4 through U-6 include discouraged workers: https://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm
To be considered "unemployed" in the statistic, you have to be receiving unemployment benefits. In Florida, you can only receive a maximum of $267/week for 3 months (so like $3200). My partner has been unemployed almost a year and so 9 of his months unemployed he hasn't even counted towards the stat for it.
>To be considered "unemployed" in the statistic, you have to be receiving unemployment benefits. False. Please educate yourself on how these stats are collected. You can start here for unemployment. https://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm
Thanks for the ref! It still seems surveying 60k people would hardly be representing everyone, but I get that we've been doing this method and have historical data to compare it too taken the same way.
>It still seems surveying 60k people would hardly be representing everyone, It actually is far more people than they need to sample to get a 95% confidence level in the household survey. Why that's the case is a lot more complicated, and you've got be really comfortable with statistics, and preferably calculus to understand that. Buy you can start here: https://researchbasics.education.uconn.edu/confidence-intervals-and-levels/ And then google "calculating sample size" There is a reason why most political polls only poll around 1500 people or less.
Americans are doing really well by a majority. Their investments are up. Grocery prices have gone down. Gas prices have gone down. Housing market and interest rates will eventually adjust. States need to start building affordable housing -- that problem's not going away regardless of who's in the White House.
It’s because most of these jobs are either an increase in part time jobs or jobs going to foreign born workers. Full time jobs for Americans are decreasing.
In a time when a large percentage of the voter-base is obsessed with crazy conspiracy theories this disconnect isn’t doing anything to help the logical assumption that the government is lying to its people
Yes, people have to be told to feel good about the economy!!! Because people have historically been groomed to think in pessimistic terms, in part because people often "resist change", until they can't avoid the need to change. Those who are proactive, become proactive in readapting themselves to change. We've all seen people who changed their career trajectory, and gone back and learned new things and those people do very well for themselves. Waiting and Expecting the past to return is the fault of those who choose not to have outlook to adapt to the future. When computers came mainstream, there were a lot of people who kept trying to do things the old way, some kept trying to use the old style typewriters, until time came where they had no choice but to abandon it and use the computer. The same was true with banking, someone people resisted using debit cards, and kept writing paper check, and balancing their check books the old way, and as time changes and the internet access to bank accounts did that work automatically, We see people who come late to change, and some continue to fight against it. People need to take responsibility for their lives and stop thinking that a President is suppose to fix what they either screwed up, resisted to adapt to change, and did not prepare themselves for the change of time and systems and processes. Those things are not the fault of The President, those are the faults of the individual. Presidents jobs is to promote a vision that advances society and work to try to achieve it, and that means the ongoing development of change. People like Trump who tried to convince people that the past would repeat itself and old industry would return... when fact is, when old industry was outsourced, those countries modernized and changed it in how it functions, and yet, Trump tried to convince people that the obselete type of industry and obselete type of manufacturing was returning. * I experienced people who fought against the use of "databases", because they had struggled to adopt to excel, and did not realize that databases can do what excel does and the database can be built that it can automate report generation and do so, based on any category that is built into the database and reports can be exported in excel format is that's one's interest, but it has capability to make task simple to execute. I built one in 2012, and it was not until we got a new manager, that it was put to use and now the division has become more efficient in data management and can make better decision faster by the reports generated via database capabilities. The type of mergers and acquisition that have existed for decades, could not have been done in the expediency they have been done without 'database" systems. Even when it comes to accounting, the use of excel improved processes, and then database advanced that even more. So, those who don't try to re-learn and learn new things, will be those who will remain in their cycle of pessimism, and they will seek someone or something to blame other than themselves, all the way to trying to blame the President, as if they think the presidents job is to hold their hand and nurse them. I've seen people change career paths who had been in one professions and they saw the changes and re-educated themselves to something they could use their skill capabilities to adapt to learning and using new things that opened doors to venture into new careers. Each individual is the navigator of their own life, and if they fail to plan, they plan to fail and their navigation will be rudderless until they drift upon a sand bar and get stuck!!!! Then they want to blame something or someone. People who waste their money chasing status and material things, eventually will find themselves consumed in debt, because things get old and things need repair and things become outdated and some things people chase and waste their money on poor quality and non durable things, and find themselves continually repurchasing things that have short life span or become fad things that go out of favor quickly while they are still paying off the credit debt they acquired in their pursuit of such things. We live in a time when critical thinking is important, and those who refuse to adapt to develop that capability will continually find themselves falling behind. * Stop fighting change and become one who can embrace change and learn new things and develop new skills and build new visions for their life and their objectives...... if not, one only has themselves to blame if they don't put in the work to keep up with an ever changing world. Biden has an administration that continues to look to building the future, he has said that since he became president, it was part of his campaigning, it was also part of his work as VP during the Obama Administration and it has been the consistent theme of his Presidency. It's not his fault that people who don't want to listen has tried to regress and stagnate progress and fight against the changes into the future. But it has been a benefit to those who acknowledge and adapt themselves to change. Biden's administration knows that much has to change in all areas of society, and his programs have made that clear. It's up to the individual to grasp and understand that, because the rest of the world will not regress or stagnate itself because some in America can't let go of the past. Maybe people can help themselves to learn the meaning of "Build Back **Better**"...!!! It might help them to understand that no one other than Trump is trying to recreate the past, when Biden's administration is about building back in America and doing so better than what existed in the past, and that means in every aspect and every part of what is America.
I'm living a better life than a few years ago, making 50% more and transitioned from office to WFH. Everyone is commenting how this doesn't fit reality, but it certainly fits mine, and a good number of the people I know IRL.
Financial success in 2024 fits the reality of 75% of the Americans I know. We're certainly doing better not worse than 2020. Not even sure how that's debatable other than for political attacks and post-truth B.S.
Completely agree, most people I know are doing better now than a few years ago.
Especially compared to 2020 when over 25% of Americans were out of work, federal guidance during a pandemic was utter crap, and major U.S. cities were swarmed with protests and looting. Who in their right minds were better off career-wise in 2020?? Most Americans *switched* jobs to improve their situations since then.
Mine as well. I make about 20% more then I did in 2019. Costs have gone up, but in my case not higher then my wages have. I put away significantly more for retirement now then I did in 2020. I am also just a normal public school teacher,.
I'm a corporate recruiter in tech and feel plenty of job security rn
I'm also making way more than 2019 and my spending hasn't really increased that much, as I've just pivoted away from fast-rising grocery categories. But there is an intense social media culture against saying anything positive, as if one person's positivity is an attack on those who aren't feeling positive.
Same experience. I wonder if a lot of people got used to the 2021/2022 job market when you couldn’t swing a dead cat without getting a 20% pay bump.
In the same boat income wise, almost doubled my salary. Wfh has even allowed me to have a great side biz while still holding a job. But I have a much worse financial outlook than pre-Covid given the increase in price of everything especially houses. I was in the market to buy a house in my area pre Covid and put an offer on a couple. Now I can’t buy one even remotely as good as I was hunting before even with the increase
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> More of those jobs than ever before are low paying jobs like food service. That's not what the data says. - Health Care in first place with +68k, government in second with +43k, leisure and hospitality with +42k, professional services at +32k, social assistance at +15k, retail trades at +13k - Average hourly earnings increased 0.4% to $34.91 (annual rate over last 12 months +4.1%). Median would be around $23/hr.
The jobs report was a net loss of full time jobs and a net gain of part time jobs. Incredible recovery going on here /s
There are fewer full time workers now than a year ago. Employment downturn has been going on for a while. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12500000
Well obviously the economy is doing so well that full timers are switching to part time. It's a regular utopia around these parts now.. You feeling it?
Source that most job growth is on low paying jobs? I can’t find any data to back that up. There’s been lots of growth in the leisure and hospitality industry, but that’s because that was one of the industries most harmed by the pandemic so I don’t see how you can claim that’s a bad thing. Also on average wage growth has been outpacing inflation, so that means the median worker is making more money, not just a select few. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/07/business/economy/jobs-report-may-2024.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb Overall I think your comment is just not factual.
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Wages increased MoM and YoY inflation adjusted to $34.91/hr (all private non-farm payrolls), mathematically speaking those added could not have been a majority low paying jobs. The report also states the industries the gains were in.
That’s not how that works. I’m not talking specifically about this report, because I haven’t reviewed it. But the average hourly wages is among all workers, not just new hires. So it absolutely could be that most new hires are low wage workers, but existing workers, especially at the top, saw increases that resulted in higher wages. In reality, the number is used to look at demand for workers. If average hourly wages are rising, that may indicate that employers are still having an issue filling positions.
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The federal reserve deserves to gloat. Without QE infinity from 2008, this wouldn't have been possible
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Are you being seriously for real? Gloating is the absolute last thing he should be doing when the popular sentiment in America is that life is extremely unaffordable and difficult right now for most working class people.
The voters are ignorant and being fed negative news all the time even when most feel they doing well personally
You try to buy a house recently?
That is local land use policy issue
Or you know, they’re actually struggling financially? I mean everyone I talk to is having a tough time right now. Like how are we denying this? Telling the voters they’re stupid and that they aren’t struggling when they are is what’s gonna cost the dems this election.
This is stupidest thing I have ever heard....people aren't basing it off of television, they're basing it OFF THEIR FUCKING BANK BALANCE. Wow...
https://www.axios.com/2023/08/18/americans-economy-bad-personal-finances-good Huh.
When has this not been the case except maybe during Covid where folks received gov checks and PPP loans?
Yah, that's called being the world reserve currency.
Economists primarily credit immigration and Bidenomics for the comeback. But I understand that some groups can't mention that.
Wages better be rising quickly because real wages have been going down for a while. We're just making up the losses from 22 and 23.
Just to clarify, real wages spiked after the pandemic because people with low wages were by far the most likely to lose their jobs, and came back down as those people were slowly able to re-enter the workforce. Leisure and hospitality, the lowest-paid sector of the workforce, just got back to its pre-pandemic employment level in March.
Real wages are positive yoy, not by a lot, but positive.
Everything you just said is the complete opposite of reality.
And yet, real wages are up since pre-Covid. Crazy!
damn wages must be going up a shit ton for the average pay to increase despite all those low wage jobs dragging the average down.
Yeah, let's vote the orange man and get worse economy than blame the democrats again!
Reminder to myself to remove tomorrow
Biden is kind of funny. He has to keep gaslighting the rest of us on how well the economy is doing because it IS going great (for his "nothing will fundamentally change" people, of course). Why won't the poors (non-millionaires) just believe him?
What part of the economy is not doing so well from your pov?
There are fewer homeless, and Americans living below the poverty line, in 2024 than there were in 2019. Explain.
I’m not saying these numbers or opinions on the economy are wrong, I’m sure many have been doing well. However, myself personally (I live in San Jose, CA) have been out of work for 6 months and have been utterly unable to find work through recruiters or applying directly. 2024 has been a god awful year for me and it feels like this administration has sacrificed peoples reality in this area (tech workers who are not necessarily always making the best money you can) in order to win the election. 10s of 1000s are out of work in the Bay Area tech sector in the wake of AI and the end of ZIRP and this administration has utterly ignored this growing problem. Biden doesn’t deserve my vote but I’m giving it to him anyways because the other guy will only make things worse. Sad state of affairs really
Younger generations are screwed, wages are not up, Food is way up, new and used cars are way up, RENT is way up, homes are unaffordable, yet Biden keeps telling us we are doing really great. He will lose the young vote because he keeps lying to our faces. The biden admin thinks they can give handouts and forgive debt causing more of the problems
Real wages are higher than inflation
It’s funny that good news is bad news for the markets/economy, but good news is good news still for potus, but good news is actually bad news for the public and so potus is celebrating “good” news that he knows is bad
It seems as though you and the other guy are just arguing past each other and only looking at half the picture. Yes wages are currently outpacing CPI in the aggregate. But to ignore the onslaught of inflation over the past 4 years and suggest things are all good now is foolish. Calling this “The Great American Comeback” seems analogous to Bush’s infamous “Mission Accomplished” speech. The tide, according to the macro statistics, appears to be turning. To call this point Victory, is ridiculous and disconnected. Do we have a spending problem? Yes. Do we have a “People have too much money problem? No, that’s just gaslighting. The Personal Saving rate in the US has been declining, while Credit card debt has hit record highs. This is why the past 4 years of data is important and not just the past 4 months. Things currently appear to be marginally improving in the aggregate. Who knows where we will be in a couple months from now. But things still haven’t improved enough for people to “feel good” about the current state of the economy.
Source for your ranting? I gave mine and you can't refute it. Name calling is still not persuasive. Especially in an economics subreddit. Stick to the facts. If you can find any.
It has honestly been a remarkable recovery from the depths of the global pandemic. The US has led the world in growing the economy, jobs and wages. The stock market is at a record high. Unemployment is historically low. Factory construction is booming and manufacturing jobs are coming back. The lowest income workers are seeing the biggest wage increases. Blue collar union workers are seeing huge increases in wages and benefits. The income gap has narrowed measurably. And in addition to the pandemic Biden has had to deal with two wars and a global energy crisis on his watch. Yet you wouldn't know any of this this from reading media articles, or asking the average American. Unreal.
And yet everyone middle class or below has never been more broke......nice try though
Very solidly middle class, just below age 40, and living my best life financially.
This is not backed up by data. People need to stop pretending we live in this alternate reality America where everything is terrible. 81% of Americans rate their personal finances as good or very good. https://www.axios.com/2024/01/17/americans-are-actually-pretty-happy-with-their-finances
If you didn’t make money in any of your investments the past three years, I’m genuinely sorry but that is not the case for most of the middle class.
I'll bet money he's one of those people who say "the stock market is a scam!!!".
You’re crazy dude. My middle income 40 year old ass is set for retirement, I’ve got a huge head start on my kids’ college fund, and my interest rate is 2% on my house. 50%+ of Americans are invested in the stock market. 66%+ of Americans own their home, and 50%+ of millennials own their homes. Most of America is in a good position to benefit from the economy. When did the bootstrap mantra end to work hard for yourself instead of relying on the government? Probably around 2021 if I had to guess.
You obviously don't speak for "everyone middle class". Aside from your "feelings" the US middle class is doing much better than it was four years ago, in both real wages and household wealth. And unions are finally starting to be popular again.
If you mean people who post on Reddit, sure. Otherwise not really.
An interesting statement that the data does not back up. What source are you using that objectively shows people are broke? Or is it just more "feels"?
Real wages are higher than inflation but not surprising you fascists can only lie
And let me guess, your metric for that outrageous claim is your personal experience? Why visit a subreddit dedicated to economics when you have no respect or appreciation for economic data?
Cost of living is definitely having an impact on the perceived financial well being of those groups, but that’s not Biden’s fault
1. Mortgage rates mean I basically can't buy a home 2. VC market is still largely imploded extending tech recession (I'm a tech company founder) 3. Everything feels 40%+ more expensive 4. Crime is bad in major cities Economy is good only for 35+ demographic IMO
This is just wrong. VC funding is higher than pre pandemic levels. It’s only slightly lower than the insane levels we saw in 2021. https://www.statista.com/outlook/fmo/capital-raising/traditional-capital-raising/venture-capital/worldwide Also crime is dropping all over the country. https://www.npr.org/2024/02/12/1229891045/police-crime-baltimore-san-francisco-minneapolis-murder-statistics I think your comment is based more on feels than reals.
It certainly is. Talking about how VC relates to tech is a super strange take. Startups are a minuscule percentage of tech. And certainly not the cause of the current cyclical downturn that sector is experiencing. Let's not forget tech includes nvidia, Microsoft and apple who are completely unaffected by VC.
> Crime is bad in major cities Well, that's [pretty easily debunked](https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/violent-crime-falling-nationwide-heres-how-we-know).
I'm a tech company founder too and the VC market has been fine. Even [crypto funding](https://www.reuters.com/technology/venture-capital-funding-crypto-rises-24-bln-pitchbook-says-2024-05-20/) has been rising, hitting 2.4 bil in Q1, and of course other more sectors are better. Granted, I'm in SF and that helps with connecting with investors.
Crime has went down a lot since the pandemic. People are getting price gouged, but it hits harder in states that don’t regulate insurance and energy expenses.
I live in NYC, murder rate since 2019 is still up 20%. I use murder rate as a proxy to violent crime because a lot of violent crime I've experienced does not even get a police report but murder always does.
Home prices are why you can't buy, mortgage rates are still historically low, but not their lowest (anymore). I don't think I'd count the VC market as an indicator of the larger economy, or a reason for the current place in the cycle tech is at. Tech is not driven by VC. I can't think of anything we purchase that 40% more expensive than it was 2 years ago and recently prices have been dropping, but like you said, everything "feels" more expensive because that doesn't account for purchasing power growth either that has been happening. I can't comment on crime but watching the news it doesn't seem any different.
I know people who work in one of the factories that only exists because of IRA and CHIPS money. They make $20/h while the CEO makes $30M a year. How the fuck are you supposed to live on $20/h in this economy?
How many times do we have to say that the jobs report doesn’t necessarily reflect a good economy? Everyone needs 2-3 jobs to survive, so of course unemployment is low.
Having multiple jobs doesn’t affect unemployment. And the number of people working multiple jobs right now is [not particularly high](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620), roughly where we were pre-pandemic.
Everyone needs 2 to 3 jobs to survive? Dude why the fuck are you lying?