In real terms, after-tax income per person has risen at a year-on-year pace of roughly 2.6% in recent months.
🤣
Are people noticing these improvements? One of the biggest data puzzles of recent times remains as pertinent as ever: despite the economy’s strength, sentiment has been persistently glum.
I wonder why. Couldn’t be because abstract percentages mean nothing if people are working multiple jobs to afford rent, people who should have been able to retire are still working, and prices in stores stay at ludicrous rates while the minimum wage fails to come even close to where it needs to be.
Meanwhile, an alternative measure of economic sentiment—an index calculated by Goldman Sachs, a bank, and based on social-media posts—is much rosier. Its upward lilt points to a clear increase in optimism in the past half year.
Oh my mistake, they forgot to consult Goldman Sachs. 😂 All is okay in the world after all.
Not just Goldman Sachs but the version of Goldman Sachs that is apparently using social media as an improved method of reading tea leaves.
2.6% increase in income is a decrease when food is up 33%, energy up 10%, and housing is up 20–100%. I was once under the impression that economists are essentially mathematicians. Turns out they missed the very basics.
They can delude themselves and their already-deluded readership but they can’t convince people that they’re better off when those people know, viscerally, that their tummy is rumbling all day and that they’re shivering under the covers every night.
🤣
I wonder why. Couldn’t be because abstract percentages mean nothing if people are working multiple jobs to afford rent, people who should have been able to retire are still working, and prices in stores stay at ludicrous rates while the minimum wage fails to come even close to where it needs to be.
Oh my mistake, they forgot to consult Goldman Sachs. 😂 All is okay in the world after all.
Not just Goldman Sachs but the version of Goldman Sachs that is apparently using social media as an improved method of reading tea leaves.
2.6% increase in income is a decrease when food is up 33%, energy up 10%, and housing is up 20–100%. I was once under the impression that economists are essentially mathematicians. Turns out they missed the very basics.
They can delude themselves and their already-deluded readership but they can’t convince people that they’re better off when those people know, viscerally, that their tummy is rumbling all day and that they’re shivering under the covers every night.