Fuck the economy. Make my goddamn grocery bill go down. Make the fucking rent go down. I’m so sick of the rich dictating every aspect of my life while I barely get by all so they can tell me “everything’s great!”
The economy is booming because of all the money corporations are charging you for your food and rent.
My job is laying off people every 6-12 months despite having immense reserves of wealth. Remind me how great the economy is?
God I hate how insular tech workers are. Anything that happens in tech, they think happens universally.
When the economy was tanking and tech was doing great: “the economy is very fair and just, you need to work harder bootstraps blah blah”
When house prices soared: “just buy a house in the middle of nowhere for dirt cheap and keep making your big city salary like me!”
Now the economy is doing great and tech is finally experiencing a correction: “omg the sky is falling!!”
Fuck the economy. Make my goddamn grocery bill go down. Make the fucking rent go down.
These things are actually the things that make up the economy.
The problematic thing with inflation is that when people get a pay raise they think it’s not because the economy improved, it’s because they worked hard for that pay raise. Sure no one’s disputing that you worked hard, but if you worked hard and the economy didn’t improve you wouldn’t have gotten that pay raise.
And yeah food prices are high. Something about a land war in the part of Europe that produces a lot of the global grain supply may have something to do with that. That situation would be resolved sooner if the GOP stopped blocking the funding to go towards ending that situation sooner.
Real estate… yeah that’s because the rich suck. Gotta tax those bastards so they don’t keep dumping their excess wealth into real estate which drives up prices. But again, the GOP isn’t going to approve of that.
Biden has done insanely well on the economy despite the efforts of the GOP to sabotage him.
So be angry, but know who to be angry at. The guys blocking things have a majority in congress and has the filibuster in the Senate. Maybe that should change?
My anger is aimed squarely at the correct people and things. I know how this shit show works. People making minimum wage, you know the largest group of earners, hasn’t had a raise regardless of the “economy” in nearly 15 years barring a few blue states. This country grows tons of food that just gets shipped off or used for plastic so if grain production is the issue it’s a logistics issue and not a supply issue. Our government is ineffective for the average person. It’s amazingly effective for the rich and corps. There is nothing we can do about it either because voting is a performative act instead of a meaningful one. Our 2 presidential candidates are thousand year old dust factories. They’re supported by either 100 year old dust factories or younger sociopaths who are only in it for power and money. At the local level it’s meaningless because of you’re in a red area there’s no way to win and if you’re in a blue area everyone’s too busy patting each other on the back for not being red that they still don’t fucking do a good job.
The problem isn’t me being angry, it’s that more people aren’t.
Edit: I was wrong about the number of minimum wage workers.
People making minimum wage are not the largest group of earners, its actually a very tiny minority of workers that earn the minimum wage.
So be angry, but know who to be angry at.
Lockheed Martin and company along with the politicians they own perpetuating endless war, leading us into the abyss while chasing short term profits.
Both the Gaza war and the Ukraine war are inflationary pressures and the US is pumping billions of dollars into both.
Fyi, the US president cannot set prices for these things.
That said, he’s trying, using what power he does have.
No he’s not trying. He’s giving the appearance of trying just in time for 2024. Do you really think Biden is going to take on Blackrock?
I wouldn’t get your hopes up on substantially lower grocery bills.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/02/02/grocery-price-inflation-biden/
But there is no immediate fix for policymakers. Grocery prices remain elevated due to a mixture of labor shortages tied to the pandemic, ongoing supply chain disruptions, droughts, avian flu and other factors far beyond the administration’s control. Robust consumer demand has also fueled a shift to more expensive groceries, and consolidation in the industry gives large chains the ability to keep prices high, economic policy experts say.
“I think people are waiting for prices to return to what they call ‘normal’ — and with the exception of a few things, like eggs — we’re not going to see that. We’re going to see prices stabilize, and that’s likely it,” said Dawn Thilmany, an agricultural economist and professor at Colorado State University.
Robust consumer demand has also fueled a shift to more expensive groceries
How dare people need to eat
That’s not what that says at all.
What it says is that people are feeling more flush with cash and are opting for higher end brands of food over the store brands or nicer cuts of steak or going out to a nicer restaurant instead of just hitting up McDonald’s or shoneys. This is proof that the economy is doing well.
Voters don’t care about the economy as long as their cost of living situation is worse.
Biden has called out the greed of businesses, but we’ve seen no action from the government to rein them in.
How is Biden supposed to have done anything to rein in corporate greed when he’s stuck with a Republican controlled house that refuses to even entertain the faintest notion of the slightest hint of the merest idea of reining it in?
The rate of increase is slowing rapidly: In December, prices for food consumed at home were up by just over 1 percent, according to the Labor Department. But administration officials say Mr. Biden is keenly aware that prices remain too elevated for many families, even as key items, like gasoline and household furnishings, are now cheaper than they were at their postpandemic peak.
And yet there is a general belief across administration officials and their allies that there is little else Mr. Biden could do unilaterally to force grocery prices down quickly.
“It’s hard to figure out what the short-term policy response is in this situation,” said Bharat Ramamurti, a former economic aide to Mr. Biden and an author of a report on grocery-price inflation that the progressive Groundwork Collaborative in Washington published on Friday.
I think we can expect Biden to be loud about grocery prices and grocery store profit margins, because the price of almost everything else has stabilized or gone down. He can issue executive orders that do little to directly influence prices, but any more would require legislation, and, well, the party that controls the House wants higher prices.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/01/us/politics/biden-food-prices.html
“Economy” is such a bullshit term here. What they really mean is stock market. The real economy is shit. Pay is shit. Healthcare is shit. Real estate is a fat hog that needs to get slaughtered already. When will the people be treated as Too Big To Fail?
Ehh, I think the economy is doing okay. Inflation is being controlled/managed. In some cases it’s correcting itself.
Don’t lose sight of the forest for the trees. The media in this country has been really pessimistic about the economy and blaming the admin–to the point it seemed intentionally misrepresented.
This economy could have gone the other way pretty easily especially with the billions thrown into circulation during the pandemic.
If we want to credit Presidents when the economy is bad, you need to credit them when it’s good too.
If anything this admin should get credit for being stable and a source of order in all of the chaos–not the cause of it.
Ehh, I think the economy is doing okay. Inflation is being controlled/managed. In some cases it’s correcting itself.
I have to agree. Some people are still certainly struggling, of course. Homelessness is still a problem in places. Many people still live paycheck to paycheck. But the economy isn’t going to fully right itself in four years, especially with a hostile House that controls the purse strings.
Additionally, nothing has been done about greedflation (yet?). If Congress or Biden can figure out a way to force companies to stop tacitly colluding to squeeze more money from people, I would suspect more people would start to feel more optimistic about their finances (and the economy in general).
Greed will sadly have to wait…when your ship is sinking you gotta patch the holes first, then you can rebuild the troublesome parts.
The US is putting fingers in the holes of the dam right now and doing an okay job of it.
Some people are already too big to fail. It’s just not you or me.
Look at Trump. He’s too big to fail. He’s not in jail, despite numerous counts of accusations, from rigging elections to treason to sexual assault.
When you’re rich enough or connected enough, you’re too big to fail.
If you owe the bank $100 that’s your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that’s the bank’s problem.
– J. Paul Getty
It’s worse, when it’s us g peoples donated election money for personal expenses, including legal expenses. Do the people donating understand that they’re not even getting a campaign out of their cash? Why isn’t this misuse of funds yet another criminal charge?
It’s about jobs more than the stock market. The report says over 350k net jobs added in January (more than double expected) and unemployment has been below 4% for two consecutive years (not seen since the ‘60s). Plus inflation is quickly dropping and the administration is lowering costs on things where they can, putting more money in our pockets. It’s legitimately incredible what’s happened with the US economy since the pandemic nearly guaranteed a recession, according to Fox News.
The numbers for the real economy have been good too. The median wage rose faster than inflation in 2023 and unemployment has been consistently low, people are finding work and finally starting to earn more. Obviously things aren’t great for everyone but it’s going way better than anyone expected and it’s heading in a good direction rather than deteriorating further like when inflation was still out of control.
*jobs exist that don’t pay a living wage, sending workers ever deeper into poverty and despair*
media and politicians: “LoOk At AlL tHe JoBs! BoOmInG eCoNoMy!”
The economy is only booming for the rich, anyone trying to tell us otherwise doesn’t care about our well-being. If it were doing well they wouldn’t have to keep telling us, we could see it in our everyday lives.
Gas prices are down. General cost of living is stabilized. Unemployment is extremely low and the percentage of eligible workers on the sidelines is dropping. Wages are up for the lowest income levels and continue to climb despite slowing inflation. Black households, in particular, have seen a significant narrowing of the income gap, more so than they’ve seen in many many years. The percentage of women in the workforce is up and salaries are climbing for them as well. In fact, the post-COVID recovery has been wildly successful when you compare it to post-2008 with respect to the improvements for the poorest among us, which is precisely the opposite of what you’re claiming.
Yours is purely an appeal to anecdote. The data is clear. Unfortunately, as study after study has shown, data can’t compete with vibes, and we just spent the last two years with the MSM (not to mention social media…) telling everyone a recession was around the corner.
Housing costs are sky-high. Rent is ridiculous. Good luck ever trying to own a house. And yeah, cost of living went way way up and now it’s “stabilized” there.
And to say wages are up is just laughable. I mean, yeah people are now being paid $15 an hour instead of $10, but what does that matter when food and housing costs increased more than that?
The data is skewed by the people that benefited from raising the price of everything during COVID-19 and then never brought the prices down.
The rich are richer and they are the measuring stick for the economy because they own all the news sources. It is dramatically worse for the poor now than it was 5 years ago.
Don’t let bullshit propaganda fool you.
I feel like this CONSTANTLY happens and people just eat it. Prices skyrocket. Then they stop rising or maybe even dip a little but still remain way higher than they originally were and… Problem solved! It’s stabilized! In fact prices are DROPPING! huzzah!
Makes me wonder if people are really this easily fooled or are they all just being ignored? Lol
The economy is booming, but not in all sectors. Housing is the biggest notable exception. Inflation was bad, but it’s gotten better. Pretty much everything else is doing great. Even car prices are coming down.
Cheapest 1 bedroom rent can find is 2.3k/month.
Where though? If you’re in a historically HCOL area, then that’s hardly surprising.
I’m in an easily commutable suburb of one of the largest metro areas in the country and there are 1br apartments available in decent areas for $1000-1200ish. Not what I’d call “cheap” but a far cry from what you’re claiming.
If his is purely anctedote, then yours is decontextualized.
Gas prices are down.
Sure. Since a high in June of 2022. The last time gas prices were at this level was June 2021. And the time before that was October 2014. Which is to say, for about 6 years, gas prices were lower than today. And just looking at the graph, they were significantly below today’s level. Just to note, they have yet to return to the levels before the precipitous rise stating in December 2020.
There maybe, as you noted, vibes, but they ain’t wrong.
Unemployment should be looked at with, of course participation rate which has held even for the last year, and how long people have been unemployed which has been growing slightly for those unemployed for 27 weeks or more. This also doesn’t address underemployment which disporporstely effects the young and poor. Underemployment colors one’s outlook for stability in the present and future.
Thankfully, Biden and others in the administration have managed this far better than 2008 for the average citizen. Not having a recession is a good thing. I’ve lived through several. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t looming concerns. Inflation is still higher than the target and instigating further disinflation is uncharted territory.
Data, in of itself, is not enough. It needs to be contextualized to develop political and social narratives. Addressing people with condescension and dismissing their anxieties as mere vibes fails politically.
I think people are expecting all the prices to return to “normal” when that’s probably never going to happen, as a good chunk of the price increases are due to post-covid inflation
I stopped reading at gas prices are down. They are up .40 the last week.
The data is clear
The gaslighting is all thats clear. All the data conflicts with your claim. Homelessness up to the highest level ever recorded, housing is unaffordable, food is unaffordable, wages are stagnant, income inequality is the widest ever recorded.
Looking pretty low to me. Speaking in terms of this week makes no sense to me.
I stopped reading at gas prices are down. They are up .40 the last week.
This is just as stupid as saying because it snowed, global warning isn’t real.
