3 ms·
> when someone says "the economy is great", that's relative to post-covid and two multi-decade wars the US fought and a global recession not even two decades ol
by ajross 3y ago
> when someone says "the economy is great", that's relative to post-covid and two multi-decade wars the US fought and a global recession not even two decades old.
No? It's relative to pretty much all of 20th/21st century data. Can you point to some numbers that you think tell a different story? We are vastly wealthier than our grandparents. Real[1] median household income is 50% higher today than in the 80's. See: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N
It's down a little (like 5%) across the pandemic, which is what everyone seems to be freaking out about. But that correction is behind us now and things are looking good again, which is causing a somewhat counter-intuitive anti-anti-freakout a-la your comment. Which is what the linked article is about.
Cheer up, basically. You've been fooled by the discourse into believing things that aren't true.
[1] Where "real" means "inflation-adjusted"
- Fire-Dragon-DoL 3y agoI have no idea about the numbers but wouldn't median household income be 50% higher because both adults work (and they have no kids) now?
- candybar 3y agoLabor participation rates among women haven't changed drastically since the 80's. Also: https://economistwritingeveryday.com/2022/06/22/us-households-have-a-lot-more-income-than-1967-and-its-probably-not-just-because-of-the-rise-of-dual-income-households/ https://economistwritingeveryday.com/2022/06/22/us-household... > In fact, this is also a period when the number of two-income households shrunk, from 35% in 1987 to 32% in 2020. During this time period, overall household income increased by 18.5% (inflation-adjusted with the CPI-U-RS). For households with just one earner, income increased by almost the exact same amount (19.1%). Income of two-earner households did increase even more (37.7%), so seeing the full distribution would be very useful.
- ajross 3y agoThe way to address "not knowing anything about the numbers" is to actually look up some numbers and not just pontificate incorrectly. Real median personal income shows essentially an identical curve: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEPAINUSA672N https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEPAINUSA672N
- Fire-Dragon-DoL 3y agoI haven't pontificated, I asked a question, and I really didn't want or cared enough about the topic to do a search, so I asked the question in case somebody already knew