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That's great! But nearly everyone I know not in tech is right at the end of their rope. Like one event will quite literally destroy their precarious lives, and

• redcobra762 3y ago
  It's true that sentiment seems low, but are we sure that's an objectively relevant measurement? Sentiment is impacted by many things beyond reality; are we sure there isn't some other underlying problem in society that's causing people to be substantially more pessimistic and negative about their lives?
  • giraffe_lady 3y ago
    It seems like you're using words like "objectively" and "reality" carelessly as synonyms for "true" which they simply are not. We can be sure it is objectively relevant because it is what people are experiencing, which is of course reality. If you can demonstrate that there is some other non-employment related reason people feel this way, does that mean they don't feel it? Or are somehow wrong to? Where does that even get you? Maybe there is something else! There are probably lots of things going on. People keep saying this is affecting them though, and we have to believe them that it is.
    • Retric 3y ago
      What the problem is impacts how you solve it. Spending less time on YouTube may not improve your financial situation, but it could change how secure you feel. On the other hand a second job can help if you’re actually just drowning in collage debt etc.
    • YetAnotherNick 3y ago
      Example of what GP is trying to say: crime rate against children are objectively(as in true) lower now than it was a generation before yet parents are more worried about child's safety. And people "feeling" something is a very weak evidence.
    • redcobra762 3y ago
      Apologies if it seems I'm replacing "true" with "objectively" and "reality." This wasn't my intent. I used them with their dictionary definitions, and what I wrote ought to make sense if taken that way. Your argument here seems to defend the validation of people's feelings. If my point is accurate, you argue, then how people feel doesn't matter. Instead, consider what makes people feel bad about their general situation; if the cause of low sentiment isn't economic, then an improved economic situation won't improve sentiment. It's important to tease out these things. Lumping everything together may allow us to "legitimize" negative feelings, but it doesn't give us a clear view of the causes, prohibiting our ability to consider viable improvements.
      • giraffe_lady 3y ago
        The way you're using these words is at best sloppy, something akin to weasel words that position yourself as an authority and others as merely biased observers. What does it mean for a someone's belief that they are one mishap from financial disaster to be "objectively relevant?" Are you saying they're wrong about their own precarity, or simply wrong to feel bad about it? It's certainly relevant to them that they feel this way. Whether it aligns with a measurable metric is another question but not the one they were talking about. Similarly, what "things beyond reality" are people using to come to these conclusions? Astrology? Are they hallucinating their dire financial situation and the penurious chasm beneath them? Using the words correctly doesn't mean you are using them rightly. In this case you are not.
        • redcobra762 3y ago
          Like I said, you’re pitching my argument as, “People feeling bad is not valid.” This isn’t what I said. At this point, only someone who wants to fight would read what I wrote as you have. A more reasonable interpretation of what I’ve written would be that sentiment may not be entirely associated with economic safety. “It is unlikely that sentiment would improve if unemployment dropped further”, would be a good illustration of my argument, for example (a point you alluded to elsewhere in this submission). I recommend trying to read what I wrote with a less aggressive agenda, because the way you’re approaching this interaction is too hostile for a reasonable person to presume positive intent. It seems more likely to involve your own bad mood than anything I’ve actually written.
    • racketcon2089 3y ago
      I think your reading is uncharitable. Luxembourg has a 6% unemployment rate, the US has a 3.7% unemployment rate, and North Korea has a 0% unemployment rate. Those unemployment numbers are objective realities in terms of being a reflection of a set of collection methods and definitions. But those are not merely a poor proxy for the population's overall wellbeing, they are actively _misleading_. Prices for food, housing, medical care, education, and used cars going up in the US by 20-50% in a 3 year period while corporate profit margin percentages are at historical highs does not inspire confidence in the future. Throw in an ongoing decline in life expectancy that puts the US firmly in the category of developing countries while paying 250-400% more GDP for medical care than other industrialized countries, two costly proxy wars which threaten to continue growing in scope, outright state and regulatory capture... ...and worst of all, a political, economic, judicial, and cultural elite with a fairly bipartisan mainstream consensus which doesn't appear to be willing or able to seriously address these issues with policy favored by suparmajorities of the voting public but not by the largest donors. When the people in charge have been pissing on your leg for decades and tell you that it's just raining when you never see them get wet, you can't expect the abuse to stop in the future, not even if you elect the alternative from one of the two oligarch-backed choices.
      • giraffe_lady 3y ago
        I was taking issue with the comment's condescending and manipulative use of words like "reality" and "objective" to dismiss people's understanding of their own experiences. My reading may have been uncharitable but, obviously I believe, appropriately so. I'm not taking a stance on "what is wrong with the world" here per se, but if I were I'm more aligned with what you're saying than thinking 0% unemployment is the solution to our problems or whatever.
        • racketcon2089 3y ago
          We all only have a coinflip chance of inferring tone online so I wouldn't feel bad. It's also possible I misinterpreted both your comment and the OP to a degree. There's a lot of politically driven economic boosterism in the air right now (more than usual even) and I may have lazily assigned you to that camp with scant basis. It's natural for politicians and their adherents to cherry-pick the data and intentionally withhold context on it to make themselves look as good as possible, while their opponents do the reverse. Then everyone accuses the other side of ignoring their numbers which they say are the true reflection of "reality." Ever was it thus, but it's more exaggerated in these conditions where both the "good numbers" and the "bad numbers" break records and can zig-zag suddenly.
  • ageek123 3y ago
    People today are more able to see people who are doing better than them economically, through social media etc., than at any time in the past. This is a huge contributor to the negative sentiment.
• michaelteter 3y ago
  Unemployment is obviously just one of many metrics. I would like to see a chart with overlays of GDP, unemployment, average CEO-to-worker-pay-multiplier, average congressional and presidential election campaign expenditure, average net worth increase for different brackets (including top 0.1% individuals), etc. I highly suspect that the CEO multiplier, campaign expenditure, and 0.1% net worth increase lines would move similarly... and would imply that they are more significant indicators of how (poorly) the normal people are faring compared to other/previous years.
  • lmpdev 3y ago
    Unemployment is also a poor metric in and of itself as it discounts large groups of people Participation rate is much more meaningful IMO Example, the participation rate is currently ~67%, so its inverse is 33%. This means that 33% of the working age population are currently not employed
    • rendang 3y ago
      Why is it meaningful given that the 33% includes people who have no desire to work?
      • Herring 3y ago
        No desire today != no desire tomorrow. A lower participation rate might indicate untapped potential or barriers to employment, such as lack of childcare or training opportunities.
      • catherd 3y ago
        How healthy would the economy be if 100% had no desire to work? That depends on why those people don't want to work and the overall situation, but until all of our needs are served by robots in reality likely not so healthy.
    • lotsofpulp 3y ago
      That is not at all what the labor force participation rate means. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CIVPART https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CIVPART > The Labor Force Participation Rate is defined by the Current Population Survey (CPS) as “the number of people in the labor force as a percentage of the civilian noninstitutional population […] the participation rate is the percentage of the population that is either working or actively looking for work.”
• morkalork 3y ago
  I'm not in US but unemployment where I am is shockingly flat. Like literally net 100 jobs in December. Problem is when you see stats like the number of gig workers doubling in a year... Those aren't exactly the good, steady jobs with benefits that lead to a happy retirement.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• ageek123 3y ago
  > in the U.S. there is basically NO safety net This is not true.
  • nemo44x 3y ago
    Some people confuse safety nets and hammocks. They want a system with hammocks.
• throwaway5959 3y ago
  Maybe they should get into tech or some other skill that provides value to the marketplace.