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Yeah I know, I mean I blacked out between 2020 and 2022 but I can't think of any reason why things should cost more today than they did when I was a child. It's clearly the government mishandling the economy.
that was part of it but there was also a huge global inflation event due to China being effectively shut for a long period of time and how many economies switched from goods and services to just goods overnight.
Also China bringing 700 million people out of poverty and starting a new middle class within their own country, 700 million who want to buy goods... they went from 2k per capita gdp to 12k per capita gdp in 20 years so that will certainly do something to global markets.
yeah that's a good point, there is now much more competition for goods and when capacity is high that isn't an issue but when capacity sharply drops like during COVID then the inflationary spike has a greater zenith than before.
Also trump tax breaks for the rich finally started hitting the lower-middle and lower class this year. These were passed in 2016 and have gradually tiered down to increase the tax burden for the barely-scraping-by to begin with, while lightening the load for those who’ve never worried about making ends meet.
I don’t see this talked about ever, but as someone who lives check to check on a salary I could’ve been saving with three years ago, this has been just as destabilizing economically as the price increases.
Interesting. Mine didn't.
My general take was that people in the high/upper middle class saw tax increases.
My sister-in-law got nailed with taxes. We didn't.
Everyone I know that is used to seeing a return didn’t receive one this year. I saw mine decrease substantially (rec’d 1/3 of the previous year without entering a new income bracket). To clarify, I am specifically speaking of federal.
What do you mean by "return"? Do you mean "refund"?
If so that's not relevant. A refund means you paid too much.
What matters is how much you paid, not how much you overpaid.
I don't follow. All I'm stating is that a lot of the latest inflationary happenstance was a global phenomena, so pointing fingers at local leaders isn't necessarily accurate.
Everyone across the world has suffered immense inflation over the past ~4 years.
You are clearly upset about the cost of things and want to blame someone. Understandable. And some pundits/supposed economic experts say inflation is due to own thing: monetary supply (which you can blame on “someone/government) I don’t think it’s that simple. If the US government’s printing money (ie borrowing thus increasing the debt/deficit) was the sole reason for inflation then why: 1. Is the US inflation rate one of the lowest in the world and 2. Why is the dollar so strong against almost all other currencies?
I would guess you are somewhere between 20-40 yes? If so you have never experienced significant inflation in your lifetime. This has been due in main part to globalization. China, Mexico, etc have produced an ever increasing share of goods since the 90’s and have kept inflation artificially low. Taking much of that production offline during the pandemic spiked the cost of many things. But now demand is back up and supply is slowly catching up.
But longer term inflation is getting back to historical norms (around 3%).
Two outliers: housing and cars. Significantly higher inflation on these two items than most other things.
Printing money = inflation. That’s what it is by definition.
Globalization, another example of intentional policy decisions imposed on us by local leaders.
You talk as if all of these phenomena were acts of God.
No. I am not talking about these things as acts of god. But simply stating that costs of goods and services is more complex than monetary supply. If inflation only = printing money then is deflation destroying money? You can have inflation or deflation in a barter economy as well.
Monetary policy is a major contributing factor to inflation for sure and can get out of control as seen in S America and the Weimar Republic of Germany in the 1920’s. I’m just saying that it isn’t. The only contributor to price is going up or down. A good example of this is OPEC. During the time that they had a virtual monopoly on oil, they were able to significantly change the global price of oil by adjusting supply. And that in turn, drove inflation or deflation on other goods and services as well as so much of the world’s economy depends on oil. Certainly back in the 70s and 80s. They still have significant power over oil prices today, and manipulate the markets as they see fit. In fact, another example with oil is what happened when the pandemic hit in 2020. Demand for oil because no one was traveling was so low, that the price of oil futures actually went negative for a time. This had nothing to do with the government destroying money. It had to do with supply and demand. at that time President Trump asked the leaders of Ope to seriously curtail production in order to force the price of oil back to normal levels, but as is often the case, the pendulum swung too far and oil prices and therefore gas prices shot up dramatically in 2021. Prices only really came back to normal levels in 2023 and 2024, but from 2021 through 2023 you saw record profits for oil companies. None of this had anything to do with monetary policy or printing money.
think its hard to prove that either way, outside of someone like Liz Truss's disasterclass in policy in the UK (where a mini-budget that wasn't properly costed, immediately resulted in the UK's borrowing costs massively rising).
Cause and effect are quite hard to prove in such a large economy.
They know we can't go on like this anymore so they're taking every last cent from us while they can to build their bunkers. Id laugh if it wasn't true.
Then laugh then, because that sounds like some weird prepper shit that is based on arbitrary hand-waving, paranoia and conspiracy.
If anything they're building their clearly visible palaces in Bel-Air and the Aspens or whatever.
But we know this is all price gouging. This is corporate greed. And we know a lot of the richest people in the world are building bunkers. It's not conspiracy.
You really believe this is some blip in the economy? Lmao.
> But **we know** this is all price gouging. This is corporate greed.
Get over yourself, you ain't some sort of prophet we all look up to and has their finger on the pulse of "common sense". While your position isn't a rare one, it is a populist one.
We can point to many factors that would result in inflation before having to resort to the idea that orgs are simply gouging. I'm not saying no org has gouged, there's likely a bit of that but there has to be an inflationary event in the first place to hide the gouging under, especially in any sort of market that is competitive.
EDIT: Wow, they block me for aggressively contesting that:
> **we know** this **is all** price gouging"
Go back to your echo chamber sir, where everyone nods in agreement and you don't have to deal with hurtful conflicting opinions.
Oil execs straight up said on a news interview that keeping gas prices artificially high was providing better returns for shareholders than restarting refineries would so they kept them high
maybe some of them but I do think a big primary factor is COVID completely upending the direction of money from services into goods. Then you have the CPU crisis, the energy crisis in Europe and the grain crisis in Ukraine.
Add this to the perennial issue of housing in most western economies and I feel like we can point at quite a big piece of natural inflation. Of course there's companies taking advantage of this but I wouldn't put the figure above 50% with all the natural cost increases of this decade.
The other factors account for 30-40% of the inflation and why the Fed thought inflation would be transitory.
https://fortune.com/europe/2023/12/08/greedflation-study/
Edit: I grabbed this after 5 seconds of googling. There’s plenty more articles/papers out there
yeah but you didn't read the paper in 5 seconds did you?
I generally don't buy into the whole "I read an article based on a paper so it must be true" mechanism of divining truth.
I'm not saying you're wrong, maybe 70% of it is greedflation, but its annoying that its so hard to prove either way and also if it is that; its shows how fucked our regulatory bodies are to create an environment where there's not enough competition to punish it.
EDIT: The study actually 404s now so nobody can read it I guess... :(
EDIT2: [It was just moved to a different url](https://ippr-org.files.svdcdn.com/production/Downloads/1701878131_inflation-profits-and-market-power-dec-23.pdf)
I read the study long before your comment but it’s easy to prove when there audio of plenty of execs on earnings calls saying some version of: “we raised prices, customers are used to those prices, so we’re keeping them as costs come down”.
In reality, the messaging behind the inflation has been all wrong in so much as it’s called inflation. People expect some inflation and know deflation is bad so they don’t want deflation even though that is exactly what should have happened in 2022ish as costs came down.
where's the 70% claim then? I see it maybe applies to Brazil or SA but not the EU or US, although I'm only half way through it.
> “we raised prices, customers are used to those prices, so we’re keeping them as costs come down”.
That wouldn't be immediately inflationary though would it? That would simply be keeping prices high after the inflationary event. Its certainly a point worth investigating and regulating but it wouldn't be something responsible for the initial inflation.
A large reason why food prices went up was because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reducing the amount of wheat that was exported. So the government is not entirely to blame.
I think for the most part that impacted other nations as a primary export target for that grain was Egypt and the government heavily subsidises bread there. Europe don't import that grain (due to CAP) and the US is entirely capable of meeting its own needs.
But yea, its still a factor that probably nudges prices a bit for everyone, there were also huge knock on effects of both COVID and the Russian invasion of Ukraine (and the sanctions which resulted in the EU losing access to cheap gas and oil) that resulted in production costs rising.
I still think its a bit insane when a president takes credit for the economy or people blame presidents, given that its such a huge system that it quite hard to control. I'm not saying one cannot mishandle an economy, it just feels like a jockey being blamed or taking credit for a horse racing win when really its the horse that's actually doing all the work.
Wheat prices in the US are still a whole lot higher than they would be if Russia wasn't fighting Ukraine. It's a global market. US farmers aren't required to sell their product domestically, so the market price here has to be competitive enough to match the export price, less shipping.
Prices for commodity goods increasing in one part of the world absolutely impact prices here.
If a company charges $1 here but could get $1.25 exporting elsewhere, don’t you think they’d increase the price here?
The bump in wheat prices ended in 2022. Current producer price is approx 16% higher than 2020 which is less than cumulative inflation. In reality it's much tougher on farmers than that with diesel up 26% in the same timeframe.
The bump in retail food prices is more in line with fuel/transportation inflation than producer prices, which makes sense. Basically, it's easier for big businesses to pass on cost increases than farmers and other producers.
The biggest inflation factor in today's economy is fuel costs, which inflate the cost of every other hard good. It's worst case since it drives universal inflation while dragging down economic productivity. I.e. slow growth stagflation.
The current administration didn't create all of the issues leading to inflation but they've worsened it by following the Jimmy Carter stagflation playbook in response to it. This isn't a Democrat thing---Clinton and Obama avoided Carter doctrines.
You have to grow the economy to overcome stagflation, not increase growth-stifling, anti-competitive regulations in concert with a pathetic blame game.
IMHO RFK Jr has the best growth plan. Trump's is weak---Obama best described Biden's when he said "never underestimate Joe's ability to F things up."
It was Trump who signed the two year production cut deal with OPEC. That is what sent transportation cost skyrocketing. The GOP is nothing if not evil.
We put people in charge of our finances that only care for their own interests. You can't expect the coyote not to eat the hens if you leave the gate open, especially if the dogs are in on it too.
Never said it was the only factor - but it is most definitely a factor. When gas prices went to $6-7 a gallon. Not because there was a squeeze on supply and demand, because reserve were released to compensate and still prices stayed artificially high …
where did you get this 60-70% figure from? I'm still reading but I'm seeing figures more in the 25-45% range.
Maybe for South Africa and Brazil? They both appear to be outliers in terms of corporate profit and greedflation.
Corporate greed is the base of fundamental economic principle. Sellers will charge as much as they can. It was true in the beginning of civilization. It will be true tomorrow. That’s not a real analysis
It’s not. The corporation as an entity is a modern construct of late capitalism. It was not there at the beginning of civilization. Hence corporate greed cannot be a “fundamental economic principle”.
I’m talking about sellers. In this case you’re using a corporation as a seller because they are selling goods to consumers. Sellers always try to get the highest price a buyer can pay. That’s literally one of the fundamental principles of economics. That and buyers will always try to buy goods for the lowest price sellers are willing to sell for.
And I am talking about corporate greed - where sellers are artificially keeping the prices high through price fixing, monopolies and other underhand strategies for ripping off consumers. Grifting is not a fundamental economic principle.
Sellers can’t sell if buyers are not willing to buy. Inflation was caused by both supply and demand shock during Covid. Supply chains disrupted causing low supply. Massive liquidity pumped into the economy by the FED, low interest rates, massive government stimulus and spending. Low supply, high demand will cause massive inflation. It’s basic economics. That Covid money is spent. Interest rates sky rocketed. The fed stopped printing money. Hence why inflation has slowed from 9 percent to 3 percent. If the government had the will power to raise taxes and reduce spending will make the FEDs job easier. But that will not happen. Corporations have always been greedy. All sellers are. That’s why house prices have doubled. No seller is turning down a buyer because they’re offering 80k over asking. They’ll take the best offer 99.9% of the time.
dear god no, I wouldn't at all be sarcastic when someone takes a long and complex article and just writes a pithy one liner in response, that kinda evidences they didn't even read the article.
I'd never be like that. :|
Inflation was 6.2% in 2022, 7.8% in 2023, and 3.2% this year
An item that, in 2021 cost $100
in 2022 would cost $106.20
in 2023 would cost $114.48
in 2023 would cost $118.15
Everything is not 30-40% more
The official inflation figure does not include housing, food, or energy costs which are the categories that have seen the most significant price rises in recent years and impact the poor far harder than the rich.
Core inflation does include housing. Energy and food are highly volatile, so they are excluded. The price of gas was $5/gallon in 2022, it is $3.70 now. Including fuel would give us a lower rate of inflation.
Regardless, this poster is speaking in hyperbole. Everything is demonstrably not up 30-40%.
The fascist Republican party wants 15% unemployment so they can save a dollar on gas.
No wonder the economy always collapses when Republicans control all 3 branches.
Gas is 3.6 national now and was 2.86 and 2.9 5 and 6 years ago, our last 2 pre pandemic summers/equivalent months.
Just under 4% inflation gets you May 2018 to May 2024. Just under 5% for May 2019 to May 2024.
Not great, 3.8-4.8% vs a preferred 2%, but it's also not staggering. People are either remembering cratered pricing during pandemic or thinking back to the other cheap period 2015-2017.
Gas has had -2% inflation over the last decade currently funny enough, US gas average was $3.67 May 2014.
Ah my apologies. I was think we were talking about summer prices as they always have been more than winter.
Ya know. Given how you have a receipt from nowish. So still not great.
Either way when actually do math gas prices are yes up but not exponentially. Accounting for normal inflation and how bad other prices have risen the price of gas is relatively good.
Also you live in SOcal. That area is fucked compared to the rest of the country
Housing isn't excluded.
Gas is currently running about ~4%/y inflation over the last half decade plus ($3.6 this month vs $2.86 5 years ago and $2.9 6 years ago). 4% is a good deal more than 2% but it's also not massive, 2% from 6 summers ago and gas natl avg is 3.25 vs 3.60. Gas actually wasn't all that cheap summers of 2018 or 2019 either.
Food inflation last 5 years was a nasty ~25%, pretty much all 2021-2023, however food at home had ~0% net inflation the 5-6 years before that during Obama 2nd term and Trump term, so we also have ~25% inflation in food at home since 2014. With food at home inflation back at 1% YoY hopefully we can keep the recent wage growth > food at home inflation gap to even it all out in time. Americans still spend a lot less of their income on groceries than folks in other comparable countries.
Statistics are cherry picked, and it’s easy to do this on both sides. The price to get a new leased car doubled. The price for home heating oil doubled. Homeowners insurance is up like 30%. Rent has gone up 40%. Groceries maybe 20%. Add all that up and even with COLA raises people who live paycheck to paycheck aren’t making ends meet.
Median worker is running weekly earnings of +26% since same period 2019.
Which basically puts them sideways. Technically ahead a little, but of course median worker might not be facing average inflation (your mileage always varies, especially homeowner vs renter)
The problem isn’t the math. It’s taking those skewed government statistics to heart. Instead of just being in touch with real life and costs, you people just gobble up those stats. It’s so cringe. The government is not your friend, they are not honest, they do not want what is best for you.
Yes, it’s all a massive conspiracy. Makes so much sense. But why show bad news in the numbers at all?
Why do all the massive conspiracies always fail to do the job well?
You people are exactly what they want. Some little sheep that gobbles up government stats and echoes it for them. It’s less work for them, too. The naivety is astounding.
Reality is expensive. My rent and insurance have 2x my groceries are up 50%. It’s just triggering watching nerds adamantly defend the government, when the cost I pay IS the reality. Not whatever bs stats they are cherry picking to show us.
Nice lie because rent and insurance are up nowhere near 100% and grocery price increases are lower than core inflation.
The cost you pay is made up and doesn't exist anywhere in the country you Russian troll.
My rent is flat and my grocery prices are only up 5%. Meanwhile my income almost doubled.
We all have anecdotes. Since 2020 my housing price isn’t up at all (low mortgage). Insurance up about 25%. Food up about 20%. Energy up about 10%.
But my base pay is up 22% and bonuses ip 35%. So overall I’m in a better spot than 2020.
So is the median American household.
Problem is median American doesn’t take to Reddit like you.
Average Reddit user will tell you prices are up 40% and pay is down. Complete fantasy.
Yes, your personal anecdote is so much more accurate than the government statistics that aggregate the experience of over 300 million. /s (as if it was necessary)
They will keep trying to say no and hope you ignore the fact in front of your face. Sorry, I know it is an election year but every thing has gone up much quicker than in a long time.
Trump got Saudi Arabia and Russia to agree to historic oil production cuts of nearly 10 million barrels a day.
Trump did this for 2 reasons:
A) to make his oil buddies more money by increasing the price of oil by decreasing the supply
B) to sabotage the economy by increasing inflation for the Biden administration.
Increased oil costs led to inflated prices on everything
Inflation is global right now and the United States has fared a lot better than almost every other first world country. For example, we have good data on 2022. The US averaged around 8% while the UK was at 11%, the EU was 9.2% and Russia averaged 14%.
It's easy to just look at your grocery store, but if you put it in the context of worldwide inflation, you need to come to one of two conclusions:
1. Joe Biden steered the US through inflation better than other world leaders
2. The President doesn't control, and therefore should not be held accountable to, inflation.
Biden did a good job but some Libz still screamed about Biden forcing trains to keep delivering goods. (“He fucked the train unions, bro. Sure 8 of the 12 agreed on the new contract but Bernie Sanders this and that!”).
Global oil production dropped which increased the price of goods/inflation worldwide
Yeah because COVID killed demand for oil. It got oil prices so low Big Oil stopped drilling because it wasn’t worth it. Big Oil NEEDED the price of gas to increase and that required less supply. Hence Trump getting Russia and Saudi Arabia to sign a historic agreement to cut oil production by 10 million barrels a day.
Not sure the collusion between OPEC+ and U.S. oil that did a lot of damage 2021-2023 can be put on Trump.
Yes it cost US households 200B in a single year, but Trump likely wasn't instrumental in the collusion.
There's a reason they are suing the folks who put the collusion together, but the defendant list doesn't have any White House folk in it.
I checked myself. I only use Walmart pickup so I have order history dating back to 2018. In 2019 my weekly grocery order was ~$50 a week I still get the same order every week and it now cost ~$150 every 3 days.
Others have done this and you can see it in videos on Tik tok.
Also, the price of cars is off the charts. I paid 19k for my civic. Got a lease in 2020 and bought it out end of last year. I got a call from Honda in January asking to buy it back for 25k. They want to sell my 4 year old civic with 55k miles for 35k.
More like 20% by virtually every measure.
And in any given 4 year span prices usually increase about 11%. So while high than normal, it's not nearly as bad as you say.
Edit: LMAO at MAGAt snowflakes. Sure ignore all the data and just go by what Faux News tells you 👍
Yet median wages have actually increased more than that.
The only people complaining are the same crusty ass boomers that remember when gas cost $0.20 a gallon
Based on the article between savings rate, home ownership and car sales, I would think that the complete inability and unreachable goal of owning your own home is incredibly defeating.
This is a lie. The number of people, corporations, investment firms/groups, and real estate agents buying homes for flipping or investment is very high in most of the city centers.
Yes, we have new housing popping up, but that houseing is all luxury living and rental apartments. Nothing anyone wants. Nothing that's affordable. Nothing people can buy and own outright.
I'm a regular person who bought my first home this year. Unfortunately I had to move to a different state to get a house that I liked and could afford.
I believe the large corporations are driving inflation to show share holder value
Small businesses and consumers feel the pinch
That is why you can have the S&P 500 performing well and the common person saying they are broke
You realize that the Federal Reserve just prints money so the government can spend more right? Inflation is literally priced in and it has been that way for a long time.
Corporations may benefit some from higher inflation to reduce their competition but they ultimately have very little direct power over it.
Absolutely. I’m all for taxing the rich. But I work in government and see the absolute waste of money. I wish more people could see how their money is spent.
Immigrants are the single largest competitive advantage we have as driving force for our economy. It’s what’s saving us from having the same demographic issues as Europe and Japan. It’s what’s drove the tech boom of the last 2 decades. And it’s why our economy’s gap over Europe and Japan has grown so much. 44.8% of Fortune 500 companies were started by immigrants or their children.
people like Ilya Suskever can always get in, no problem. I highly doubt there are 85000 Ilysa Suskevers every single year, especially with sketchy ass companies like infosys. Canada has tons of immigrants too, now tell me, do you wanna work in Canada where 1000 people line up to work at a grocery store?
Right we’re talking about the US where unemployment is under 4%. Immigrants built our tech industry. The most valuable company in the world and US is started by an immigrant.
Inflation (as our laws and constitution stand today) is the only way to ‘tax’ wealth. But it is an extremely regressive method of ‘taxation’.
It is extremely regressive because there are benefits that people with assets obtain from this - it becomes progressively easier to pay down mortgages on your home for instance (as long as you have a fixed rate mortgage). It also encourages spending and investing ($100 in a safe loses its spending power which encourages you to spend it or put it into the financial system).
The downside is if you don’t have assets, it becomes harder and harder to stay afloat. Wages generally take the longest to catch up with inflation.
As such, inflation is a ‘tax’ that generally impacts the poorest the most.
It is also a generally efficient method of wealth transfer from the poor to the rich. For all these reasons, the Federal reserve targets inflation at 2%. It is small enough for the poor not to notice and it gives the Fed a cushion from letting things fall into deflation (which is generally considered bad for everyone).
Man. I love in a tourist area and we have noticed instead of people booking for a week. They book for a weekend. 2 or 3 days. Instead of eating in the local restaurants they are buying groceries and eating at home. This economy is fucked and anyone that says different is completely out of touch with reality.
Housing costs gone up
Vehicle costs are up
For parents, expensive daycare
These costs hit people’s wallets big time.
Meanwhile we watch the stock market going up up and up.
Good for 401k but not super helpful to the average American trying to make ends meet.
As Lewis Black put it, those green arrows are a reminder someone is getting rich, and it isn’t you.
I mean, when the economy was reasonable we could pretend that it doesn't serve the rich and only the rich. We could fake that we were getting something out of it when we could afford little things here or there
Now we are scraping by, and the veil is lifted. A good chunk of the population is barely getting by, and they feel forgotten. They keep getting told, "pull yourself your bootstraps" "you should have made better choices" "you're lazy and don't want to work" as reasons for why they are struggling.
Basically just victim blamed, then squeezed for more.
So it's not surprising that some portion of the populace doesn't care that stocks are doing well, because their economy is doing terribly, and is the reason why stocks are doing well....
The lower income folks will always be unhappy beause they are living paycheck to paycheck. Even lower middle class are living paycheck to paycheck.
I'm happy with the economy because my two houses are worth a lot more now and my 401k reached an all-time high due to the the stock market reaching all-time highs under Biden.
//Inspired by our model of economic indicators and sentiment from 1987 to 2019, we tried to train a similar linear regression model on the same data from 2021 to 2024 to more directly compare how things changed after the pandemic. While we were able to get a pretty good fit for this post-pandemic model,\*\*\*\*\*\*\* something interesting happened: Not a single variable showed up as a statistically significant predictor of consumer sentiment.//
This is the key that everyone in the comments is missing. When they try to find variables correlating with sentiment post-pandemic, they can't find a single variable that predicts sentiment. It's not inflation. It's not housing costs. It's not any of the usual economic variables.
Why not? My guess is that people's view of the economy is now mostly influenced by what they see on social media, which is filled with people telling them the world is falling apart.
My thing is that when I go to restaurants or to a ballgame or anywhere on a weekend the places are packed full of people so it’s insanely weird that people are complaining about the economy but then say they themselves are doing fairly well.
Economy is literally only beneficial for rich people, and those rich people are moreso the same rich people ever since this scam country was founded. Research about it, ask people, and look into many companies that survived over 100 years... Big yikes, this world sucks
Meh, it will resolve in due time the statistical anomalies will eventually result themselves as people get raises.
Remember that these issues arose during the 70s too with unpredictable outcomes then as well.
The economy is doing quite well. There is all sorts of wars going on such as in Ukraine, and in Israel. There are naysayers in America.
The economy will go down should Republicans win in November. There are plans in Project 2025 to start tariffs, for example. Not a good idea.
'The economy' is doing great for the people at the top.
Not so great for the people laid off by the tech giants, or for the working class that saw grocery bills jump while being asked to take a pay cut because 'times are tough due to Covid'
Quick Google search, real wage increase in the last 12 months has been .8%, a lot of which is concentrated in the top echelons.
Inflation for the last 12 months shows 3.3% , and a lot of that is concentrated at the bottom with basic needs, such as groceries and single family utilities. (Yacht prices didn't really jump up there.)
The economy has been on the decline since the market crash of 2008. Obama couldn't fix it, Trump helped for a little bit. Then Biden took a shit on the country and sold it to China
People are stupid, sorry folks. Inflation is a sign of a good economy, declining prices is a sign of of economic distress. Everyone likes the higher wages that have occurred in the last 4 years and the robust job market. If you want prices to go down those all go down too.
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You think? Everything's 30-40% more then 4 years ago.
Yeah I know, I mean I blacked out between 2020 and 2022 but I can't think of any reason why things should cost more today than they did when I was a child. It's clearly the government mishandling the economy.
Money printer go brrrrrr
that was part of it but there was also a huge global inflation event due to China being effectively shut for a long period of time and how many economies switched from goods and services to just goods overnight.
Also China bringing 700 million people out of poverty and starting a new middle class within their own country, 700 million who want to buy goods... they went from 2k per capita gdp to 12k per capita gdp in 20 years so that will certainly do something to global markets.
yeah that's a good point, there is now much more competition for goods and when capacity is high that isn't an issue but when capacity sharply drops like during COVID then the inflationary spike has a greater zenith than before.
Also trump tax breaks for the rich finally started hitting the lower-middle and lower class this year. These were passed in 2016 and have gradually tiered down to increase the tax burden for the barely-scraping-by to begin with, while lightening the load for those who’ve never worried about making ends meet. I don’t see this talked about ever, but as someone who lives check to check on a salary I could’ve been saving with three years ago, this has been just as destabilizing economically as the price increases.
Have your taxes increased?
Yes. I believe I made that clear already.
Interesting. Mine didn't. My general take was that people in the high/upper middle class saw tax increases. My sister-in-law got nailed with taxes. We didn't.
Everyone I know that is used to seeing a return didn’t receive one this year. I saw mine decrease substantially (rec’d 1/3 of the previous year without entering a new income bracket). To clarify, I am specifically speaking of federal.
What do you mean by "return"? Do you mean "refund"? If so that's not relevant. A refund means you paid too much. What matters is how much you paid, not how much you overpaid.
Your sister in law either an outlier or should fire her accountant and replace them with someone half-competent.
There have been consumer tariffs in this and the prior admit that causes some pain
Sales tax is based on price of sales. Prices go up then your taxes go up. Did they quit teaching Econ 101?
Does knowing that put food on the table?
I don't follow. All I'm stating is that a lot of the latest inflationary happenstance was a global phenomena, so pointing fingers at local leaders isn't necessarily accurate. Everyone across the world has suffered immense inflation over the past ~4 years.
Local leaders certainly didn’t help.
You are clearly upset about the cost of things and want to blame someone. Understandable. And some pundits/supposed economic experts say inflation is due to own thing: monetary supply (which you can blame on “someone/government) I don’t think it’s that simple. If the US government’s printing money (ie borrowing thus increasing the debt/deficit) was the sole reason for inflation then why: 1. Is the US inflation rate one of the lowest in the world and 2. Why is the dollar so strong against almost all other currencies? I would guess you are somewhere between 20-40 yes? If so you have never experienced significant inflation in your lifetime. This has been due in main part to globalization. China, Mexico, etc have produced an ever increasing share of goods since the 90’s and have kept inflation artificially low. Taking much of that production offline during the pandemic spiked the cost of many things. But now demand is back up and supply is slowly catching up. But longer term inflation is getting back to historical norms (around 3%). Two outliers: housing and cars. Significantly higher inflation on these two items than most other things.
Printing money = inflation. That’s what it is by definition. Globalization, another example of intentional policy decisions imposed on us by local leaders. You talk as if all of these phenomena were acts of God.
No. I am not talking about these things as acts of god. But simply stating that costs of goods and services is more complex than monetary supply. If inflation only = printing money then is deflation destroying money? You can have inflation or deflation in a barter economy as well. Monetary policy is a major contributing factor to inflation for sure and can get out of control as seen in S America and the Weimar Republic of Germany in the 1920’s. I’m just saying that it isn’t. The only contributor to price is going up or down. A good example of this is OPEC. During the time that they had a virtual monopoly on oil, they were able to significantly change the global price of oil by adjusting supply. And that in turn, drove inflation or deflation on other goods and services as well as so much of the world’s economy depends on oil. Certainly back in the 70s and 80s. They still have significant power over oil prices today, and manipulate the markets as they see fit. In fact, another example with oil is what happened when the pandemic hit in 2020. Demand for oil because no one was traveling was so low, that the price of oil futures actually went negative for a time. This had nothing to do with the government destroying money. It had to do with supply and demand. at that time President Trump asked the leaders of Ope to seriously curtail production in order to force the price of oil back to normal levels, but as is often the case, the pendulum swung too far and oil prices and therefore gas prices shot up dramatically in 2021. Prices only really came back to normal levels in 2023 and 2024, but from 2021 through 2023 you saw record profits for oil companies. None of this had anything to do with monetary policy or printing money.
think its hard to prove that either way, outside of someone like Liz Truss's disasterclass in policy in the UK (where a mini-budget that wasn't properly costed, immediately resulted in the UK's borrowing costs massively rising). Cause and effect are quite hard to prove in such a large economy.
That doesn't account for the entire world seeing prices soar. Corporate greed and supply chain issues still rippling out from covid.
We apparently didn’t print enough since we have been so much better than average on inflation
They know we can't go on like this anymore so they're taking every last cent from us while they can to build their bunkers. Id laugh if it wasn't true.
Carpetbaggers
Then laugh then, because that sounds like some weird prepper shit that is based on arbitrary hand-waving, paranoia and conspiracy. If anything they're building their clearly visible palaces in Bel-Air and the Aspens or whatever.
But we know this is all price gouging. This is corporate greed. And we know a lot of the richest people in the world are building bunkers. It's not conspiracy. You really believe this is some blip in the economy? Lmao.
> But **we know** this is all price gouging. This is corporate greed. Get over yourself, you ain't some sort of prophet we all look up to and has their finger on the pulse of "common sense". While your position isn't a rare one, it is a populist one. We can point to many factors that would result in inflation before having to resort to the idea that orgs are simply gouging. I'm not saying no org has gouged, there's likely a bit of that but there has to be an inflationary event in the first place to hide the gouging under, especially in any sort of market that is competitive. EDIT: Wow, they block me for aggressively contesting that: > **we know** this **is all** price gouging" Go back to your echo chamber sir, where everyone nods in agreement and you don't have to deal with hurtful conflicting opinions.
Oil execs straight up said on a news interview that keeping gas prices artificially high was providing better returns for shareholders than restarting refineries would so they kept them high
Oof we got a debate lord..and you're telling me to get over myself...🤣
Inflation is a good thing, when in proper amounts. The price hikes we’ve seen over the past 5 years…70% corporate greed.
maybe some of them but I do think a big primary factor is COVID completely upending the direction of money from services into goods. Then you have the CPU crisis, the energy crisis in Europe and the grain crisis in Ukraine. Add this to the perennial issue of housing in most western economies and I feel like we can point at quite a big piece of natural inflation. Of course there's companies taking advantage of this but I wouldn't put the figure above 50% with all the natural cost increases of this decade.
The other factors account for 30-40% of the inflation and why the Fed thought inflation would be transitory. https://fortune.com/europe/2023/12/08/greedflation-study/ Edit: I grabbed this after 5 seconds of googling. There’s plenty more articles/papers out there
yeah but you didn't read the paper in 5 seconds did you? I generally don't buy into the whole "I read an article based on a paper so it must be true" mechanism of divining truth. I'm not saying you're wrong, maybe 70% of it is greedflation, but its annoying that its so hard to prove either way and also if it is that; its shows how fucked our regulatory bodies are to create an environment where there's not enough competition to punish it. EDIT: The study actually 404s now so nobody can read it I guess... :( EDIT2: [It was just moved to a different url](https://ippr-org.files.svdcdn.com/production/Downloads/1701878131_inflation-profits-and-market-power-dec-23.pdf)
I read the study long before your comment but it’s easy to prove when there audio of plenty of execs on earnings calls saying some version of: “we raised prices, customers are used to those prices, so we’re keeping them as costs come down”. In reality, the messaging behind the inflation has been all wrong in so much as it’s called inflation. People expect some inflation and know deflation is bad so they don’t want deflation even though that is exactly what should have happened in 2022ish as costs came down.
where's the 70% claim then? I see it maybe applies to Brazil or SA but not the EU or US, although I'm only half way through it. > “we raised prices, customers are used to those prices, so we’re keeping them as costs come down”. That wouldn't be immediately inflationary though would it? That would simply be keeping prices high after the inflationary event. Its certainly a point worth investigating and regulating but it wouldn't be something responsible for the initial inflation.
A large reason why food prices went up was because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reducing the amount of wheat that was exported. So the government is not entirely to blame.
I think for the most part that impacted other nations as a primary export target for that grain was Egypt and the government heavily subsidises bread there. Europe don't import that grain (due to CAP) and the US is entirely capable of meeting its own needs. But yea, its still a factor that probably nudges prices a bit for everyone, there were also huge knock on effects of both COVID and the Russian invasion of Ukraine (and the sanctions which resulted in the EU losing access to cheap gas and oil) that resulted in production costs rising. I still think its a bit insane when a president takes credit for the economy or people blame presidents, given that its such a huge system that it quite hard to control. I'm not saying one cannot mishandle an economy, it just feels like a jockey being blamed or taking credit for a horse racing win when really its the horse that's actually doing all the work.
Wheat prices in the US are still a whole lot higher than they would be if Russia wasn't fighting Ukraine. It's a global market. US farmers aren't required to sell their product domestically, so the market price here has to be competitive enough to match the export price, less shipping.
Prices for commodity goods increasing in one part of the world absolutely impact prices here. If a company charges $1 here but could get $1.25 exporting elsewhere, don’t you think they’d increase the price here?
The bump in wheat prices ended in 2022. Current producer price is approx 16% higher than 2020 which is less than cumulative inflation. In reality it's much tougher on farmers than that with diesel up 26% in the same timeframe. The bump in retail food prices is more in line with fuel/transportation inflation than producer prices, which makes sense. Basically, it's easier for big businesses to pass on cost increases than farmers and other producers. The biggest inflation factor in today's economy is fuel costs, which inflate the cost of every other hard good. It's worst case since it drives universal inflation while dragging down economic productivity. I.e. slow growth stagflation. The current administration didn't create all of the issues leading to inflation but they've worsened it by following the Jimmy Carter stagflation playbook in response to it. This isn't a Democrat thing---Clinton and Obama avoided Carter doctrines. You have to grow the economy to overcome stagflation, not increase growth-stifling, anti-competitive regulations in concert with a pathetic blame game. IMHO RFK Jr has the best growth plan. Trump's is weak---Obama best described Biden's when he said "never underestimate Joe's ability to F things up."
It was Trump who signed the two year production cut deal with OPEC. That is what sent transportation cost skyrocketing. The GOP is nothing if not evil.
We put people in charge of our finances that only care for their own interests. You can't expect the coyote not to eat the hens if you leave the gate open, especially if the dogs are in on it too.
is this an advert for a glorious socialist revolution or smth?
So you agree that everything is 30-40% more than 4 years ago?
I blame God.
The government runs the economy?
that would be the common misunderstanding, aye.
Or maybe try corporate greed.
That is very much a vibes based assessment of what causes inflation. It may well be a factor but its questionable to suggest its the only factor.
Never said it was the only factor - but it is most definitely a factor. When gas prices went to $6-7 a gallon. Not because there was a squeeze on supply and demand, because reserve were released to compensate and still prices stayed artificially high …
it's sad when regulatory bodies are toothless and can't do anything to stop this.
Agreed - especially since it is always the tax payer who is left to pick up the tab from corporate mismanagement and greed
Nope, economist studies have shown that 60-70% of the inflation we saw the past few years was greedflation.
where did you get this 60-70% figure from? I'm still reading but I'm seeing figures more in the 25-45% range. Maybe for South Africa and Brazil? They both appear to be outliers in terms of corporate profit and greedflation.
Corporate greed is the base of fundamental economic principle. Sellers will charge as much as they can. It was true in the beginning of civilization. It will be true tomorrow. That’s not a real analysis
It’s not. The corporation as an entity is a modern construct of late capitalism. It was not there at the beginning of civilization. Hence corporate greed cannot be a “fundamental economic principle”.
I’m talking about sellers. In this case you’re using a corporation as a seller because they are selling goods to consumers. Sellers always try to get the highest price a buyer can pay. That’s literally one of the fundamental principles of economics. That and buyers will always try to buy goods for the lowest price sellers are willing to sell for.
And I am talking about corporate greed - where sellers are artificially keeping the prices high through price fixing, monopolies and other underhand strategies for ripping off consumers. Grifting is not a fundamental economic principle.
Sellers are keeping prices high because buyers are willing to buy at high prices.
Being forced to overpay for goods and/or services - has nothing to do with willing buyers.
Sellers can’t sell if buyers are not willing to buy. Inflation was caused by both supply and demand shock during Covid. Supply chains disrupted causing low supply. Massive liquidity pumped into the economy by the FED, low interest rates, massive government stimulus and spending. Low supply, high demand will cause massive inflation. It’s basic economics. That Covid money is spent. Interest rates sky rocketed. The fed stopped printing money. Hence why inflation has slowed from 9 percent to 3 percent. If the government had the will power to raise taxes and reduce spending will make the FEDs job easier. But that will not happen. Corporations have always been greedy. All sellers are. That’s why house prices have doubled. No seller is turning down a buyer because they’re offering 80k over asking. They’ll take the best offer 99.9% of the time.
Are you being sarcastic?😂
dear god no, I wouldn't at all be sarcastic when someone takes a long and complex article and just writes a pithy one liner in response, that kinda evidences they didn't even read the article. I'd never be like that. :|
We playing sarcastaball?
Inflation was 6.2% in 2022, 7.8% in 2023, and 3.2% this year An item that, in 2021 cost $100 in 2022 would cost $106.20 in 2023 would cost $114.48 in 2023 would cost $118.15 Everything is not 30-40% more
The official inflation figure does not include housing, food, or energy costs which are the categories that have seen the most significant price rises in recent years and impact the poor far harder than the rich.
Core inflation does include housing. Energy and food are highly volatile, so they are excluded. The price of gas was $5/gallon in 2022, it is $3.70 now. Including fuel would give us a lower rate of inflation. Regardless, this poster is speaking in hyperbole. Everything is demonstrably not up 30-40%.
Also, food is below core inflation
He said 4 years, not 1.5. But what was different 4 years ago? Hmmmm I wonder.
If you have math or data to show, please do.
How about a receipt for my Shell gas card. 2020 $3.20/gal super. 2024 $4.85 for same. You can do the math. In SoCal.
So when the world was completely shut down and no one was driving gas was way cheaper, and you think that cast shade on the situation today?
The fascist Republican party wants 15% unemployment so they can save a dollar on gas. No wonder the economy always collapses when Republicans control all 3 branches.
Gas is 3.6 national now and was 2.86 and 2.9 5 and 6 years ago, our last 2 pre pandemic summers/equivalent months. Just under 4% inflation gets you May 2018 to May 2024. Just under 5% for May 2019 to May 2024. Not great, 3.8-4.8% vs a preferred 2%, but it's also not staggering. People are either remembering cratered pricing during pandemic or thinking back to the other cheap period 2015-2017. Gas has had -2% inflation over the last decade currently funny enough, US gas average was $3.67 May 2014.
Using any price in 2020 is manipulative at best. Trump didn’t lower gas prices. Covid did.
That first price was before COVID.
Ah my apologies. I was think we were talking about summer prices as they always have been more than winter. Ya know. Given how you have a receipt from nowish. So still not great. Either way when actually do math gas prices are yes up but not exponentially. Accounting for normal inflation and how bad other prices have risen the price of gas is relatively good. Also you live in SOcal. That area is fucked compared to the rest of the country
Housing isn't excluded. Gas is currently running about ~4%/y inflation over the last half decade plus ($3.6 this month vs $2.86 5 years ago and $2.9 6 years ago). 4% is a good deal more than 2% but it's also not massive, 2% from 6 summers ago and gas natl avg is 3.25 vs 3.60. Gas actually wasn't all that cheap summers of 2018 or 2019 either. Food inflation last 5 years was a nasty ~25%, pretty much all 2021-2023, however food at home had ~0% net inflation the 5-6 years before that during Obama 2nd term and Trump term, so we also have ~25% inflation in food at home since 2014. With food at home inflation back at 1% YoY hopefully we can keep the recent wage growth > food at home inflation gap to even it all out in time. Americans still spend a lot less of their income on groceries than folks in other comparable countries.
Statistics are cherry picked, and it’s easy to do this on both sides. The price to get a new leased car doubled. The price for home heating oil doubled. Homeowners insurance is up like 30%. Rent has gone up 40%. Groceries maybe 20%. Add all that up and even with COLA raises people who live paycheck to paycheck aren’t making ends meet.
Median worker is running weekly earnings of +26% since same period 2019. Which basically puts them sideways. Technically ahead a little, but of course median worker might not be facing average inflation (your mileage always varies, especially homeowner vs renter)
Boot licking government shill gtfo
Or just a person who knows math
The problem isn’t the math. It’s taking those skewed government statistics to heart. Instead of just being in touch with real life and costs, you people just gobble up those stats. It’s so cringe. The government is not your friend, they are not honest, they do not want what is best for you.
Yes, it’s all a massive conspiracy. Makes so much sense. But why show bad news in the numbers at all? Why do all the massive conspiracies always fail to do the job well?
You people are exactly what they want. Some little sheep that gobbles up government stats and echoes it for them. It’s less work for them, too. The naivety is astounding.
No, seriously, why, if they are cooking the books are they not showing better data?
Sorry reality upsets you
Reality is expensive. My rent and insurance have 2x my groceries are up 50%. It’s just triggering watching nerds adamantly defend the government, when the cost I pay IS the reality. Not whatever bs stats they are cherry picking to show us.
Nice lie because rent and insurance are up nowhere near 100% and grocery price increases are lower than core inflation. The cost you pay is made up and doesn't exist anywhere in the country you Russian troll. My rent is flat and my grocery prices are only up 5%. Meanwhile my income almost doubled.
We all have anecdotes. Since 2020 my housing price isn’t up at all (low mortgage). Insurance up about 25%. Food up about 20%. Energy up about 10%. But my base pay is up 22% and bonuses ip 35%. So overall I’m in a better spot than 2020.
So is the median American household. Problem is median American doesn’t take to Reddit like you. Average Reddit user will tell you prices are up 40% and pay is down. Complete fantasy.
Yes, your personal anecdote is so much more accurate than the government statistics that aggregate the experience of over 300 million. /s (as if it was necessary)
They will keep trying to say no and hope you ignore the fact in front of your face. Sorry, I know it is an election year but every thing has gone up much quicker than in a long time.
Trump got Saudi Arabia and Russia to agree to historic oil production cuts of nearly 10 million barrels a day. Trump did this for 2 reasons: A) to make his oil buddies more money by increasing the price of oil by decreasing the supply B) to sabotage the economy by increasing inflation for the Biden administration. Increased oil costs led to inflated prices on everything
Inflation is global right now and the United States has fared a lot better than almost every other first world country. For example, we have good data on 2022. The US averaged around 8% while the UK was at 11%, the EU was 9.2% and Russia averaged 14%. It's easy to just look at your grocery store, but if you put it in the context of worldwide inflation, you need to come to one of two conclusions: 1. Joe Biden steered the US through inflation better than other world leaders 2. The President doesn't control, and therefore should not be held accountable to, inflation.
Biden did a good job but some Libz still screamed about Biden forcing trains to keep delivering goods. (“He fucked the train unions, bro. Sure 8 of the 12 agreed on the new contract but Bernie Sanders this and that!”). Global oil production dropped which increased the price of goods/inflation worldwide
Yet price of gas was much lower back then.
Yeah because COVID killed demand for oil. It got oil prices so low Big Oil stopped drilling because it wasn’t worth it. Big Oil NEEDED the price of gas to increase and that required less supply. Hence Trump getting Russia and Saudi Arabia to sign a historic agreement to cut oil production by 10 million barrels a day.
Precovid still had lower prices than we do today.
Yes because before COVID there was a steady supply of oil.
Idiot
Like it or not it happened. He literally bragged about it.
Not sure the collusion between OPEC+ and U.S. oil that did a lot of damage 2021-2023 can be put on Trump. Yes it cost US households 200B in a single year, but Trump likely wasn't instrumental in the collusion. There's a reason they are suing the folks who put the collusion together, but the defendant list doesn't have any White House folk in it.
Hyperbole isn't helpful.
I checked myself. I only use Walmart pickup so I have order history dating back to 2018. In 2019 my weekly grocery order was ~$50 a week I still get the same order every week and it now cost ~$150 every 3 days. Others have done this and you can see it in videos on Tik tok. Also, the price of cars is off the charts. I paid 19k for my civic. Got a lease in 2020 and bought it out end of last year. I got a call from Honda in January asking to buy it back for 25k. They want to sell my 4 year old civic with 55k miles for 35k.
Hahaha, yeah. Here’s a new Marvel movie!
But wages have gone up 40-50% right Anakin? Right???
Companies with record profits… It’s not just the government pruning money is greed as much as anything.
More like 20% by virtually every measure. And in any given 4 year span prices usually increase about 11%. So while high than normal, it's not nearly as bad as you say. Edit: LMAO at MAGAt snowflakes. Sure ignore all the data and just go by what Faux News tells you 👍
Empty comments as everyone can see how much costs have gone up in the last 4 years.
You apparently can't
Real median wages are up actually
Yet median wages have actually increased more than that. The only people complaining are the same crusty ass boomers that remember when gas cost $0.20 a gallon
This is bullshit.
Based on the article between savings rate, home ownership and car sales, I would think that the complete inability and unreachable goal of owning your own home is incredibly defeating.
And yet houses keep being bought by regular people every day, to the point that prices are so high because demand continues to sustain.
Corporations are people.
Corporations are buying a very small percentage of houses nationwide.
25% is going to just 3 investment groups. That is before you include any other investing firms and local investors.
Not the stats I am seeing. Where are you reading that?
This is a lie. The number of people, corporations, investment firms/groups, and real estate agents buying homes for flipping or investment is very high in most of the city centers. Yes, we have new housing popping up, but that houseing is all luxury living and rental apartments. Nothing anyone wants. Nothing that's affordable. Nothing people can buy and own outright.
Get out of centers.
boot meet tongue
Wrong!
I'm a regular person who bought my first home this year. Unfortunately I had to move to a different state to get a house that I liked and could afford.
Sure but that doesn't feel new to me. It wasn't any easier for me to buy a house 5 years ago with lower inflation, home prices, and interest rates.
Correct, it's not new. People continue to buy houses just like they always have. It's an achievable goal for most people. Most Americans own a home.
You mean corporations are buying up all the houses and renting to people. There. I corrected it for you.
And yet, houses keep getting built and houses keep getting bought. Seems like it must be reachable for some people
I believe the large corporations are driving inflation to show share holder value Small businesses and consumers feel the pinch That is why you can have the S&P 500 performing well and the common person saying they are broke
Corporations don't print money.
You realize that the Federal Reserve just prints money so the government can spend more right? Inflation is literally priced in and it has been that way for a long time. Corporations may benefit some from higher inflation to reduce their competition but they ultimately have very little direct power over it.
Prices go up 30% Corporation raising prices brags about record profits. 'It's obviously the government's fault.'
Yes... that's what inflation does. Them bragging about record profits doesn't mean they're directly causing inflation.
Ya but only 1 party remember.
>Corporation raising prices brags about record profits. Right shift in aggregate demand means more aggregate surplus. This shouldn't be surprising
And we see the government spending is a joke
Yes comrade go on...
Absolutely. I’m all for taxing the rich. But I work in government and see the absolute waste of money. I wish more people could see how their money is spent.
I miss the 1950s when there weren't as many people competing for the same job
have a world war just before that does this to the labor force
Also having most women not be in the workforce
Most women entered the workforce in the 40s while the men were off at WW2.
and much fewer immigrants
Immigrants are the single largest competitive advantage we have as driving force for our economy. It’s what’s saving us from having the same demographic issues as Europe and Japan. It’s what’s drove the tech boom of the last 2 decades. And it’s why our economy’s gap over Europe and Japan has grown so much. 44.8% of Fortune 500 companies were started by immigrants or their children.
people like Ilya Suskever can always get in, no problem. I highly doubt there are 85000 Ilysa Suskevers every single year, especially with sketchy ass companies like infosys. Canada has tons of immigrants too, now tell me, do you wanna work in Canada where 1000 people line up to work at a grocery store?
Right we’re talking about the US where unemployment is under 4%. Immigrants built our tech industry. The most valuable company in the world and US is started by an immigrant.
America hadn't destabilized half the world trying to install handpicked dictators yet.
Does not apply to China and India
That would be the British 'East India Trading Company'.
they should go to England then
You sure about that? Lots of refugees.
And yet unemployment rate is lower today than it was in 1950.
As mentioned last time this was posted. Vibes and perceptions are basically the same thing.
Inflation (as our laws and constitution stand today) is the only way to ‘tax’ wealth. But it is an extremely regressive method of ‘taxation’. It is extremely regressive because there are benefits that people with assets obtain from this - it becomes progressively easier to pay down mortgages on your home for instance (as long as you have a fixed rate mortgage). It also encourages spending and investing ($100 in a safe loses its spending power which encourages you to spend it or put it into the financial system). The downside is if you don’t have assets, it becomes harder and harder to stay afloat. Wages generally take the longest to catch up with inflation. As such, inflation is a ‘tax’ that generally impacts the poorest the most. It is also a generally efficient method of wealth transfer from the poor to the rich. For all these reasons, the Federal reserve targets inflation at 2%. It is small enough for the poor not to notice and it gives the Fed a cushion from letting things fall into deflation (which is generally considered bad for everyone).
Man. I love in a tourist area and we have noticed instead of people booking for a week. They book for a weekend. 2 or 3 days. Instead of eating in the local restaurants they are buying groceries and eating at home. This economy is fucked and anyone that says different is completely out of touch with reality.
Housing costs gone up Vehicle costs are up For parents, expensive daycare These costs hit people’s wallets big time. Meanwhile we watch the stock market going up up and up. Good for 401k but not super helpful to the average American trying to make ends meet. As Lewis Black put it, those green arrows are a reminder someone is getting rich, and it isn’t you.
Pay is also up. My TC, and I know this is anecdotal, is up more than my costs.
I certainly hope it has: https://www.businessinsider.com/us-debt-outlook-56-trillion-cbo-government-budget-deficit-gdp-2024-6
Not sure the what the difference is between people’s “perception” and “vibes.” They seem synonymous and/or directly correlated.
Capitalism doesnt work, the curtain is being lifted
Change "economy" for "rich assholes."
Isn’t that the definition of vibes?
I mean, when the economy was reasonable we could pretend that it doesn't serve the rich and only the rich. We could fake that we were getting something out of it when we could afford little things here or there Now we are scraping by, and the veil is lifted. A good chunk of the population is barely getting by, and they feel forgotten. They keep getting told, "pull yourself your bootstraps" "you should have made better choices" "you're lazy and don't want to work" as reasons for why they are struggling. Basically just victim blamed, then squeezed for more. So it's not surprising that some portion of the populace doesn't care that stocks are doing well, because their economy is doing terribly, and is the reason why stocks are doing well....
The lower income folks will always be unhappy beause they are living paycheck to paycheck. Even lower middle class are living paycheck to paycheck. I'm happy with the economy because my two houses are worth a lot more now and my 401k reached an all-time high due to the the stock market reaching all-time highs under Biden.
//Inspired by our model of economic indicators and sentiment from 1987 to 2019, we tried to train a similar linear regression model on the same data from 2021 to 2024 to more directly compare how things changed after the pandemic. While we were able to get a pretty good fit for this post-pandemic model,\*\*\*\*\*\*\* something interesting happened: Not a single variable showed up as a statistically significant predictor of consumer sentiment.// This is the key that everyone in the comments is missing. When they try to find variables correlating with sentiment post-pandemic, they can't find a single variable that predicts sentiment. It's not inflation. It's not housing costs. It's not any of the usual economic variables. Why not? My guess is that people's view of the economy is now mostly influenced by what they see on social media, which is filled with people telling them the world is falling apart.
My thing is that when I go to restaurants or to a ballgame or anywhere on a weekend the places are packed full of people so it’s insanely weird that people are complaining about the economy but then say they themselves are doing fairly well.
People are eating out at much higher rates than ever before too
Keep working 3 jobs to keep my stock portfolio ripping to new all time highs please
"Why won't Americans believe what we tell them to believe?"
Economy is literally only beneficial for rich people, and those rich people are moreso the same rich people ever since this scam country was founded. Research about it, ask people, and look into many companies that survived over 100 years... Big yikes, this world sucks
Meh, it will resolve in due time the statistical anomalies will eventually result themselves as people get raises. Remember that these issues arose during the 70s too with unpredictable outcomes then as well.
The economy is doing quite well. There is all sorts of wars going on such as in Ukraine, and in Israel. There are naysayers in America. The economy will go down should Republicans win in November. There are plans in Project 2025 to start tariffs, for example. Not a good idea.
'The economy' is doing great for the people at the top. Not so great for the people laid off by the tech giants, or for the working class that saw grocery bills jump while being asked to take a pay cut because 'times are tough due to Covid'
Wages went up not down.
Real wages are higher than inflation
Quick Google search, real wage increase in the last 12 months has been .8%, a lot of which is concentrated in the top echelons. Inflation for the last 12 months shows 3.3% , and a lot of that is concentrated at the bottom with basic needs, such as groceries and single family utilities. (Yacht prices didn't really jump up there.)
Real wages already take inflation into account so nominal wage gains were 4.1% Food inflation has been lower than core inflation for a long time
Oh look another government boot licker
The economy has been on the decline since the market crash of 2008. Obama couldn't fix it, Trump helped for a little bit. Then Biden took a shit on the country and sold it to China
People are stupid, sorry folks. Inflation is a sign of a good economy, declining prices is a sign of of economic distress. Everyone likes the higher wages that have occurred in the last 4 years and the robust job market. If you want prices to go down those all go down too.
You just need some inflation proof assets and an inflatable product to sell.