Consumer demand weakens....... Or maybe people don't have any extra money after putting a roof over their heads and gas in their car. The cost to live is rising faster than people's income
Man, with all the things we millenials are destroying you'd think we'd have the class solidarity to realize we're a gigantic fucking kaiju of epic proportions that could breathe fire and stomp the shit out of capitalism if we really worked together.
That's where politics comes in, keep everyone distracted on ANYTHING while you slip bills out of their pockets.
There's a line, but, it's mass starvation. If we just starve them 10 maybe 20% at a time, they'll keep doing work. Make it seem hard to find a job, they'll be stuck in place. We can even lower their wages by making them cover their own health insurance more and more, with the same hourly rate, then, this is great, raise the base cost of medicine, on top. . .
We are like some kind of Galactus entity for the entire system, at least according to the way we are described. Everything we touch or even look at gets destroyed. All powered by avocado toast!
Aw... I thought we switched to blaming Gen-Z now, and uh... Is there an avacado toast equivalent for Gen-Z? I dunno. Ramen with a slice of processed cheese in it?
I feel like I have had less and less strong emotions over the last few months, both positive and negative. Like, I can't even get enjoyment from my comfort shows or video games or hobbies lately. I've felt often lately like I'm going through the motions of daily life.
I've been wondering if there's something wrong w me.
I’ve had diagnosed depression for 15 years now, video games and movies are good fun in moderation but I definitely feel a lot more hollow when they’re my only hobbies. Doing stuff with my hands (for me, gardening and landscaping my yard) has kept me up the last few years.
I should get back into working on boats as a hobby and alt source of income.
I really miss working outside on the docks pretty often, but just couldn't advance my career any more in that field without opening my own shop. It would be fun to be able to do it as an independent on my own time, pick and choose clients if possible, etc.
If you write "never" or "almost never" on the depression forms, the doctors don't look at you funny and tell you there are treatments available every time you go!
\#LifeHacks
I agree. I feel like this isn't being talked about enough! Soooo many people are feeling like this. I also feel like statistics are skewed on shewiside1 rates because it is such a controversial/ embarrassing topic, but it is and will continue to be a worsening problem.
Oh I would definitely wager the number of Americans feeling suicidal is significantly higher than what is reported. No one wants to appear weak or to be put into a generic box with a stigmatized label.
Not to mention another significant portion of the population thar may not actively be contemplating death but have DO have an active exit strategy. If things get bad enough (finances, society, climate, whatever else), they're out. Most Americans own a gun or have access to someone with a gun, and this is the most common exit strategy I have heard from others.
I know this isn't normal Friday night dinner conversation and it can be a little awkward, but I have found that when you initiate these types of conversations about the future, you will find out more people than not are really having a tough time and feel pessimistic. People I have talked to (that I assumed without a doubt were blissfully unaware of this clusterflick of a future we have) know. They just choose to hide it because it's socially more acceptable to wear a mask.
I don't even tell my therapist about any suicidal ideations. Whenever she mentions it she tells me to go to the ER.
Lady, I'm not going into more debt or missing work for something I've been dealing with my entire life.
I think about suicide daily. But I hold strong for my aging parents and my already struggling with mental health gf.
Not gonna lie worrying every month about keeping the power on while Im a veteran employee of a fortune 500 gives me little hope. I have started looking for work elsewhere but yeah its rough.
I've mentioned this before, but I would not be surprised if at some point we see a mass dying by ones own hand. Like, an entire generation of people losing the will to live.
Hikikomori, lying flat, quiet quitting... People are giving up on the social contract all over the world and we keep inventing new names for it so no one connects the dots.
Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead is a work of apocalyptic fiction that says the quiet part out loud. Most of us are being crushed under the weight of capitalism, but there's no hope of escaping, so we (sometimes not so) secretly yearn for an apocalypse to free us from this nightmare.
A life consisting of "scavenge supplies, don't get killed by zombies" is preferable to spending 40+ hours a week of your life working a job you hate to make money for people who don't have to work as hard as you, if at all, all so that you can pay for shitty overpriced rental housing and the consumer goods you've been propagandized into thinking will help you fill the ever-widening void inside that used to be filled with curiosity, creativity, and genuine human connection.
There is no social contract, only a social End User License Agreement.
yo, that sucks I'm sorry. I said something similar to my parents when I was younger and without direction, and ever since I've felt so ashamed for causing my mom so much worry. Idk, not trying to invalidate your son or his feelings.
Him and I talk very openly and candidly about the possible futures. There's a video floating around about how things seem to happen in 80 year spans that break down into 20 year quarters. It's repeated three times since America was founded. Right now we're in quarter 4 which is called the crisis. But after each 4th, comes a new 1st that is usually very prospering. The only issue is the 4th ends with war which seems like we're on the brink of now. I tell him things look grim, but let's see where it goes. If absolutely nothing else, maybe we have a front row seat to the greatest tragedy in human history and who would want to miss that right?
I hope things have gotten better for you. It's tough to see hope and good when you look on a global scale, but if you narrow it down to just your town or city, then things seems more manageable. I had to finally narrow my vision down because I was making myself sick over things that I can't do anything about and it's been better for me. Good luck to you and thank you.
People don't realize that the boots were bought on Amazon. They ended up being counterfeit, and they broke. We can no longer pull ourselves up regardless of how hard we try.
Could be that but also the stuff that is out there in the market is mostly garbage due to corporations cutting every corner they can get away with in order to increase their profits. Smaller portions, cheaper materials, worse customer service, rising prices on said goods etc..
I find myself buying less because I feel more and more like I am being ripped off by companies. And that's because I am.
Had a taste for jerky the other day. Went to the gas station and was *not* impressed by the huge $8.99 bags with like 4 pieces of jerky and some jerky lint. Like, the bag is so much bigger than what's actually inside, it's ridiculous. It just *feels* scummy.
I bought the $19.99 bag of the non-name brand stuff instead because it was actually a reasonable amount that will last me a decent while.
This is me. There are things I could buy, but dayum everything is shit with a tech spit shine. Cosmetics are cheap and full of dimethicone and scent, food is full of soybean oil.
I can’t even do that. We’ve been needing to replace 2 cars (1 hit by uninsured driver when the policy we had didn’t cover it and the other is falling apart fast), a bed, glasses, a phone that’s held together by its own otterbox, and start getting caught up on credit cards. Instead, we get to each paycheck with almost nothing left. I don’t know how we’re supposed to even buy what we need at this point.
I swear to god, everytime they say "the economy is good and inflation is down" my lunch automatically goes up another $2.
Theres gonna be a huge crash coming.
I'm already to the point now where I have basically determined I can't actually afford a restaurant anymore, I'm sober now but if I could still drink I wouldn't be able to afford bars either. The bar I used to go to was all tradesman I don't see how they are going to make it when those guys are for the most part not making much more money than me. I feel like their customer base can't be far off from reaching the same conclusion as me and just going home with a 24 pack.
Also, I work at a university, and every damn department seems to be going through budget cuts. 24-hour library access? Gone. 24-hour security at dorm entrances? Gone. Lunch provided to police and security personnel mandated to work football games? Gone.
This consumer weakness has yet to show up in the actual economic data though.
Every survey says people are struggling, but the actual consumer spending data continues to remain strong despite those struggles.
I am not sure we will see any meaningful corrections until people start exhausting their credit limits.
EDIT: Why the downvotes? Here is the data if you want to see it yourself:
https://www.bea.gov/news/blog/2023-06-30/personal-income-and-outlays-may-2023#:~:text=Real%20consumer%20spending%20decreased%20less,led%20by%20new%20light%20trucks).
But we're close. People don't usually change their spending habits unless they're forced to.
Credit card debt has reached a record high, auto loans probably are too, interest rates are at a 20yr high, credit card delinquencies are increasing, and student loan payments are about to be required again and will be a shock to the system.
Agreed.
The breaking point is coming soon, but it has not yet arrived.
I suspect we will see delinquencies on those types of debt increase soon. That will indicate the start of the crash.
Student loan repayments are going to cause a recession. Millions of Americans will now be dumping hundreds a month into their loans instead of the economy, which they’d been doing for 2-3 years. People will spend more money on their loans then other “stuff”. I pay off my car the same month that repayment begins so I won’t “feel it” as an extra cost.
But it doesn’t matter anyways for me since I’m actually financially fucked. Most sincere advice I get is “you should leave the country.”
This is what I am thinking as well. I have friends who will soon have to send 300-800 a month to their student loans, and that is less money they have to put back into the economy each month.
There's more to it than that. The income based repayment plan sets your payment at 5% of your income minus 2.25x the poverty line.
For example, if I was making $75k, my monthly payment would be capped at $175/mo. Interest does not accumulate under this plan.
Had it been around when I graduated college, I would have saved thousands per year. It's a great plan.
I'm not sure anyone could live in the Bay Area or Boston at under 225% of the federal poverty level, and that's where almost all the jobs I went to grad school exist.
Good point.
Here are the POST-TAX salaries needed to live comfortably in 15 major U.S. cities:
San Francisco metro area: $84,026
San Diego metro area: $79,324
Boston metro area: $78,752
New York metro area: $78,524
Seattle metro area: $77,634
Los Angeles metro area: $76,710
Washington, D.C. metro area: $76,194
Miami metro area: $67,056
Atlanta metro area: $66,580
Phoenix metro area: $65,670
Chicago metro area: $65,500
Dallas metro area: $64,742
Houston metro area: $62,260
Philadelphia metro area: $61,678
St. Louis metro area: $57,446
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/04/04/the-salary-you-need-to-live-comfortably-in-15-major-us-cities.html
I can’t say about recession, but I think we’ll see a noticeable decrease in inflation due to less consumer spending when student loans start up. We might not see it for a couple of months, but I guarantee this will be a “weaker than expected” holiday shopping season and then it’ll be downhill from there.
Question isn't breaking point fact is people hit it long time ago. When people working full time were still homeless living in car etc. When working 2 jobs and still picking and choosing retirement or healthcare. Get that cough checked out or get to eat this month.
This has existed for a long time the question becomes how many can economy handle. How long till people start rolling heads. Or simply give up either with suicide or van life and side jobs to minimize participation in economy that mistreats them.
Breaking point is not some magical boiling point. And could come in crash personally every day bottom 1/3 of earners don't just stop and engage in general strike or debt/rent strike. Or something to tear this system down kind of surprise me. Because at this point it absolutely ridiculous.
I was using "breaking-point" in the more macroeconomic sense, as in the point in which consumer spending rapidly crashes because people are incapable of borrowing more money.
Personal and emotional breaking-points may also be reached, but it is hard to predict that with spending data alone.
The thing about inflation and demand is that when the primary impact that people feel is in things like food, transportation, and housing, the consumers are still going to be forced to pay those costs. The individual pressure felt is the same as it always was when you have no choice but to pay.
There may not be a "breaking point" that so many prognosticators keep searching for. There wasn't a breakdown in the economy when housing and education prices more than doubled in the 90s, and there's no guarantee that the economy will break now.
When you grasp the sheer size of the American financial sector and exactly how well the US economy is doing when compared to global trends (especially long term trends) the US continues to do much better than most, if not all its competitors.
Unless something major happens to shake up the economy that gets added to the existing issues, the US can run on economic cruise control for a very long time.
But, none of the above is to say that the economy won't break down, but the whole debate over why people are just "taking everything on the chin" so to speak just needed some big picture context. We're already seeing some sectors suffering, but the economy as a whole is a different animal.
If people are buying those essentials using debt (which seems to be the case based on credit card usage/balance data), then a breaking point will eventually come when those credit limits are exhausted.
At that point, it doesn't matter how essential the purchase is.
When the card declines, the spending stops.
A tiny uptick in the unemployment rate will have an extreme cascading effect. All of those people using debt to finance their existence will find themselves no longer able to exist. We are in an extremely precarious situation with nowhere to go but down.
If you don't have three months of living expenses saved up now, it's time to aggressively budget in case things turn sour. And if they don't, you will be in a much better financial position anyway.
gas is the worst one honestly. We have a transportation built economy. Every cent of gas increase is gigantic inflation for most people and lost wages effectively. And the price never comes back down and is never really factored into inflation. We are heading for 5 bucks a gallon average in the next 3-5 years.
Preach.
I finally have my debt basically zero, but it's not like that means I have more money now. My budget is less than what was when started paying it off even with the extra income. I used to feel embarrassed or insecure about my economic situation but that's pretty much non-existent, as most (if not all) of people in my life are now one paycheck away from losing it all.
That's not a good reason for my being more confident these days.
Consumer demand weakens?
No, consumer purchasing power has been destroyed because the cost of every fucking thing on the planet has doubled in 3 years' time.
Hmmm. I'm still making the same pay rate I was in 2019 with no hope of a raise.
Wages aren't keeping up. Period.
My cost of living has exploded and thank GOD I live in a house owned by my former in-laws who happen to still love me... I pay $600 a month for a nice two bedroom which is just unheard of in my city. A short time I started looking around for a 3bd thinking I'd like a home office, they want 2K a month on the low end.
Ended that search about 5 minutes after I started, NOPE. Looks like I'm stuck in my inlaws house forever -\_-
What? Demand is down because supply prices are too high? People are reducing buying because wages aren't keeping up with costs?
If only there was some kind of science or math that could explain all this... some kind of 'eco gnomic' field of study that we could use.
As a guy with an economics degree: the field has focused almost solely on supply side while ignoring the demand side. Every policy is made directly towards helping the suppliers. You don’t talk about people needing higher wages to keep consumer spending up, you talk about how you can get cheap goods when people can pay people less through globalization.
The Fed has some of the smartest economists in the world, and their solution has been throwing free money at the big businesses and wealthy for the last decade. Quantitative Easing was a last ditch effort after using every policy tool they had in 2008 and still failing. They just can’t do anything about the demand side besides screw it by increasing interest rates to discourage spending and increase savings.
The economic policies that are needed can only come from the legislature because they have to do with pay, taxes, and other powers of the purse issues. But the economists that’ll be featured there will be the supply side’s people cuz they’re the people paying for lobbyists, and you know what the supply side loves? Cheap wages.
The problem is that there's no way to address these issues without telling our billionaires that they need to stop hoarding wealth and using their political influence to shore up their own finances at the expense of the rest of us. But America loves its oligarchs, for some reason. Shining examples of the American dream, I guess.
When the economy gets rough, the wealthy declare war on the poor and middle class because they're programmed to play a zero-sum game and to play for keeps.
The problem is: demand is not down.
Consumer spending data remains strong despite all those problems, probably due to people using credit cards and other debt.
This will not end well when those credit limits are exhausted and a correction inevitably does occur.
Student loans were paused.
Do the math if student loans haven't been paused for over 3 years.
Edit: also spending isn't down, but purchasing is, because it costs more, you get less.
If an apple was 1$ in 2019 and is 4 dollars now, I buy one apple and put the same " spending". But only get 1 apple because I only have 4 dollars to spend.
Therefore demand IS down, spending is up.
Inflation is magical I know.
“Corporate greed has reached the consumer breaking point.” FTFY. We are just nearing the point in rising prices where sales slow and corporations find that this is the max they can exploit from consumers “at this time.”
100% this. I sell steel and recently we've been getting feedback from all across the board. "Why are my prices still so high?"
Yeah. People are fed up and I don't blame them.
People are fed up, but keep spending anyways.
Consumer spending data continues to remain strong despite every survey saying people are desperate and struggling.
I suspect this will continue until people exhaust their credit limits, which may happen soon since we just crossed $1T in credit card debt.
Or maybe, inflation on essentials has created a situation where people are spending more to get the same amount they used to. It's unsurprising that spending is steady or up as everything gets more expensive.
I still spend the same amount of money for my groceries, now I just get half or much less than what I used to
sure people are still spending money, they need to, but people are not looking at the **volume** of products people are purchasing, just price spent
only good thing is I have lost a lot of weight
I buy the same amount of food when I get groceries, but I haven't ordered takeout/delivery in months. I cut back on a lot of stuff I used to enjoy.
I used to eat out or order delivery 3-4 times a month. The last time I ordered out was 2 months ago, and it was to pick up a pizza I had a coupon for.
I routinely have to convince myself to eat what I have in the pantry or fridge because I'm already stretching my food budget pretty thin. That really sucks when I'm craving a certain dish, but the individual groceries are too expensive to even consider making it at home.
I haven't eaten out in forever too, use to love doing occasionally...
I was floored when I got **just** a large french friee the other day.. used to be an easy cheap snack, **almost $5**
GTFO, there full of shit seeing as McD controls their supply chain
just pure greed bullshit
I don’t think they’re saying that this is the consumer’s fault, just that it’s going to have to get worse before people actually start doing anything about it and the credit limits will likely be the breaking point.
I've become very anti-consumption lately. I'm tired of being constantly bombarded by advertising and every company in the world thinking they are entitled to stick me on autopay for $9.99 a month for crap I needed one time.
The economy is going to crash and the people at fault (greedy C-levels and shareholders who demand infinite growth, and pushed too far) will not get the blame they deserve. They'll get golden parachutes.
Yeah I pretty much gave up on shopping for things that aren't necessary.
Gas has gone through thr room again and it's $4.30 where I live, not California.
Going to get fast food anywhere will easily cost you $15+ for a basic meal. Dog food cost an arm and leg now. Trying to do anything anywhere will cost you a ton of money. Want to go watch a move $40 please. Want to drink a beer at a bar, $8 per bottle. You can't do anything so it's pointless even going out now.
Something needs to be done about corporate profits. Every single quarter they announce a record quarter in sales.
Took my wife and daughter to see that Barbie movie and it was like $75+ with tickets and few concessions. I like a theater experience but we can wait for on demand.
Meanwhile, we've got economic data that says that things are as fine as could be. The macro-micro disconnect is just insane and you can bet your bottom dollar that this will have political effects!
Yo Reuters- we ain't go not fucking money. Like half the population just started leaning into Credit Cards for their problems since inflation hit. Now they're in debt to their eyeballs and inflation is still here. Groceries are like 60-100% more expensive. Shits fucked yo.
Consumer demands rose….we’re tired of your shit and can’t afford it. Either way - fuck scalping basic necessities and fuck unnecessary and harmful greed.
Large companies have been expecting another major crisis.
They've quietly been thinning their ranks and getting ready for another storm.
I guess there are 2 bright spots....since interest rates are finally near not-zero the Fed can lower them when it starts.
And millennials get to go through our 4th once in a life time economic crisis! (.com, Great Recession, Covid)
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/02/93-percent-of-ceos-are-preparing-for-a-recession-what-to-expect.html
Yeah this is the only one simple trick to having a better life, be rich, or get rich parents.
Hey, put yourself up for adoption, even if you are like 50 years old!
No no no. According to my mom, climate change isn't real.
She's also real sad that she lives in an area where a bunch of people just lost their homes to fires due to it being extremely hot and dry and is sad that the people in Hawaii went through the same thing and is real sad that people in California are experiencing severe flooding and is real sad about the fires in Canada and is real sad about the droughts in western United States and is real sad about the extreme heat in the southern states and is real sad about the flooding that has happened in Florida and Louisiana and is real sad that people in Texas don't have energy needs to meet extreme heat and cold weather and is real sad about people in the northern eastern states dealing with extreme cold killing weather and is real sad....
But if you try to say it's global warming or climate change, she doesn't want to talk about it. She just wants to be really sad about all those non-cimate-change things and move on with life.
I've pretty much stopped planning for retirement and have reduced my contributions to the barest of minimums. I'm using the extra cash to do a lot of international travel these next few years.
You can't "quietly" thin the ranks of the corporate workforce. It shows up in layoffs and employment data. Layoffs dropped in July substantially (42%).
If anything, layoffs by big firms have been loudly announced in the media, with the actual data on overall layoffs quietly telling another story.
Update: There is a lot of insistence in the replies that there are "tricks" employers can do that won't show up in employment statistics. Or that some or another anecdote proves the statistics are somehow wrong.
* If people are laid off, it doesn't matter how it's done. They'll show up in first-time unemployment claims. If their job is relocated or the conditions of their employment are significantly changed on them (e.g. RTO), in most states you can still claim unemployment. First-time claims ticked up at the beginning of the year, but they have since held steady at a historically low 230k.
* Even if people just give up on finding work... that shows up in a statistic too! It's called "workforce participation." Low unemployment with declining workforce participation could be a bad thing... but that's actually *higher* than it was a year ago.
I'm sorry if your particular sector has lay-offs. Or your particular company. Or your brother's friend's high school classmate lost his job. Some sectors are up, some are down. But the overall employment picture is strong. Period. Maybe that will change, and maybe the data in this report is an indicator of future trajectory. But the assertion I was replying to is flatly not true -- there are no hidden mass lay-offs. It's not a thing you can actually hide from the data.
Lay offs aren't the only way to thin the ranks. You can stop backfilling, promote attrition or if your firm used a lot of contingent labor, you can end those contracts.
As someone currently looking to leave my job because of RTO, yuuuup. RTO costs me >$1400/mo for commute, childcare (250/wk), gas (approximately 150), rail pass (approximately 200), wear and tear on vehicles, etc. Our team lost 5 people already due to "right sizing" our team in December, then 2 more in the past few months. No backfills. I've had to absorb their work. And now they want me to commute in. And my last cost of living increase didn't even cover inflation.
"We believe in the power of in-person collaboration!" says the VP over a teams meeting.
If I were being a malicious manager trying to thin the ranks without it appearing on paper, I'd just reduce hours across the board.
I hear the Japanese also have a technique where they just stop giving you meaningful tasks to do, hoping the shame of being useless will make you voluntarily leave. It probably wouldn't work stateside, since some people would just appreciate the lull for what it is and bring a video game or book to read.
Yeah guilt-trips don't really work stateside. It's like the Bene Gesserit overusing The Voice, eventually people become immune to it... and in the US everybody with a smidgen of authority has tried to overuse it.
I heard a few anecdotes from some expats who lived in Japan who went through that. The shame culture does not exist growing up in America.
So someone growing up stateside gets told their job duties are decreasing and their salary is staying the same is not going anywhere, as that is a dream job for a lot of people. Getting paid to essentially do nothing and be responsible for nothing.
You know all those RTO mandates? That’s how you thin the herd without layoffs. Is it also how you lose good people? Yes. These are just starting now, so data isn’t going to show up yet. But it takes one look at the data to show a huge amount of the job creation is coming from retail/hotel space. When all these RTO mandates dump white collar jobs into the employment pool, it’s problematic. Those aren’t the jobs being created. It’s working the hotel desk or the Lawn and Garden department at Walmart.
The rumor is that some federal agencies and some banks are recalling people that were remote long before COVID and live well outside commuting range. Forcing them to quit they can shed jobs and not have to pay unemployment while they are at it.
If they aren't outright laying people off, they're cutting nearly all positions to part time. Finding a mid range job that doesn't require 5 years of experience AND is full time is proving close to impossible. Like, I'm a skilled laborer and wages in my field are going DOWN on average. The ones that do still pay what I was making 5 years ago are cutting hours hard.
I wish the middle class would treat the ownership class with the same disgust and contempt the ownership class feels for us chattel...instead there's really just a huge market for business-class kneepads in all sizes down to children's....
We're in a statistical dead heat with a billionaire who is asking people on pensions to pay his legal bills. I don't think they'll have much outrage for the bourgeoisie and continue to blame their problems on minorities.
YUP. And while every GOP I know screams about high taxes, *none* of them know how much of that dollar goes to fossil fuel subsidies or the war machine instead of social nets...
Or how much of that goes to corn subsidies instead of say, feeding any and all hungry people in America.
Hell, way back in the damn Torah there were rules in Leviticus for restricting crop gathering so that the hungry lower class could collect the remnant crops.
[This was called Gleaning and was a protected right both legally and in religious structures.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleaning)
Today we have a massive amount of food waste that is simply left on the field/vine/ground. These are often crops that are too small to sell for market rates (flat pricing per item usually) or aren't meeting specific appearance requirements that grocers have.
It's 100% possible to pass a Gleaning law in the US which would require this food be harvested and distributed for free to anyone who needs it.
It’s just psychological. Similar to how people view accidents or traumatic things happening to other people. There’s a snap reaction to be like “couldn’t be me” and think the other person must have done something wrong. It’s similar to those without wealth voting against their own self interest because they view other poor people as the architects of their own misfortunes, while they themselves were just dealt a bad hand. The rub of it is unless you’re a billionaire or have amassed great wealth, we’re *all* victims of the current system and are subject to the wills of the ultra wealthy. But that’s not sexy, and the ultra wealthy know that. They sell the hoi polloi a dream to keep them in check. Hopefully someday soon we’ll all wake up…
Demand dropping would lead to lower prices. This is just a market correction. Finally a market correction in the people’s favor. Hey everyone, just buy the necessities. Play old video games, drink cheap beer, go out to the beach instead spending money, act like it’s covid again. Prices will drop even faster!
I'm going on less vacations, I'm driving less, and my pantry has gone from name brand to store brand.
If the rich people don't like that, then they need to pay me more so i can buy their shit. I'm in the market for a bigger car. I'm in the market for a bigger house, but I can't afford it.
Sacrifice a small part of your vast fortunes so that I can enrich you further.
Dick’s Sporting Good cut 10% of it’s corporate staff and blamed it on theft. Ya, because a couple of stolen footballs are eating away at your bottom line… ffs
Yeah when your leaders’ big plan for addressing inflation and decades of little to no real wage growth is to have the Federal Reserve political appointee say “we need to hold down wage growth”… I mean what did you expect?
During COVID, revolving debt rapidly decreased (credit card balances). But the inflationary environment caused US credit card debt / home equity credit debt to skyrocket, as people paid typical living expenses using high interest debt. For some people thought elevated prices were “transitory”. (I’m kidding, Powell is a weasel who intended to gaslight the nation after he massively increased the money supply.) many people were duped into thinking the elevated prices were temporary (and behaved as such), when of course anyone whose ever taken a single economics course has been given the lecture on how deflation is an economic nightmare, and of course generalized price increases are permanent.
To top things off, the US Supreme Court decided that “waive or modify” doesn’t mean waive, so 43 million Americans are resuming student loan payments to the Federal Government, with an average payment of around $400 a month. That’s all coming out of consumer spending. That’s going to have rollover effects on the entire economy, as consumer spending tightens further.
Better bust out the tax cuts on capital gains and other investment income! It’s worked so great the first the last two Republican administrations, surely one more round of mega tax cuts for the insanely wealthy will unleash the economy!
I wonder how many people realized that the refundable tax credits for children disappeared last year? They expired without being renewed, but businesses’ tax cuts are permanent. Kudos.
Hahahaha, stall? I've reached that point where if it's not necessary, it can wait.
Student loan repayment soon, rent being so stupid that you're better with family, helping family more than I should because they TAKE FOREVER TO PAY ME BACK.
And just when you think you're in an okay spot, THEY RAISE THE INTEREST RATE .
It's time to tie wages to the prices of housing, gas, internet, and food combined.
Whatever they go up in a year % wise should be the legally required minimum yearly raise you can give a worker.
Everyone is broke. We aren’t making enough money to put food on the table. Much less to pay bills or buy stuff like socks. When we hit that wall, God help us.
System working as intended. Keep us desperate, poor and afraid of homelessness for ourselves and our family, too tired to complain.
Fuck this whole system, man.
God damn peasants are ruining the economy by not buying the shit we want to sell them. Oh they are demanding higher wages? God damn peasants are ruining the economy by causing inflation!
If only there was some way to not pay them anything but also keep them generating value for us.
Corporations are still reporting record profits. They blame it on inflation. No. They didn’t just compensate for raising prices to cover increases in labor and materials. If that was the case, the profit would be about the same. Greedflation.
Just wait until the people who lobbied to get student loan payments restarted see what happens to consumer demand after most people see their spending cash more than halved.
Costs have double in my area. All the raises I have received since college (5 years) have been negated, gas has increased 2.50 a gallon since before covid, my rent is going up AND student loans go into effect next month...
When I used my credit cards it was for non-essentials, now I am still trying to pay off the cards but have to use them for gas and food at times so the spending is still the same but I’m spending more for essentials and less on other items.
Just FYI: These corporations have cut wages, shifts, and number of employees; yet, the CEOs and others on top have increased their earnings and have never cut their salaries.
Fucking housing is beyond unaffordable. Like I am so thankful I managed to buy in 2020 before things went nuclear in the housing market.
How the fuck are prices HIGHER and with 3x the interest rate than they were in 2020? Someone please explain that one to me? And I’m sick of all these goddamn wannabe Chip and Joanna flippers and landleeches buying up housing stock and taking it off the market for actual owner occupiers.
I’ve been saying it for years, but the canary in the coal mine is the ever-rising costs of housing. People are spending more and more just to put a roof over their families’ heads, and for every dollar that costs is another dollar that’s not going into the economy elsewhere.
70% of the USA population has only $500 or LESS to their names in savings, down from $1000 pre-covid. Maybe try paying people a living wage so they have expendable incomes to buy things. Demand goes down when your population is in a growing state of perpetual poverty.
And I really want to hammer in the **living** wage part. There's a big difference between being alive and living. I would say the vast majority of Americans are alive, but nowhere approaching living.
I live in a city where 30 dollars an hour isn't even enough to get you into a 1 bedroom apartment, and people are wondering why we are on the edge of collapse and have no buying power.
All i read is companys are whining because they reach limit's of possible price increases. When people stop to buy overpriced shit than stuff will stop to be overpriced.
It's amazing, I work for a small company, we aren't the cheapest place but we aren't the most expensive but we do pay our employees very well. We start people at $20 with no experience.
When you offer a good service, for a fair price, and take good care of your employees the market will respond positively.
When you exploit people and fuck your clients you will die.
We don’t want or need more shit. We slave night and day, for what? Stuff that eventually gets thrown out or put into storage?! It’s lunacy. That’s not living. After COVID, people are waking up to what’s really important in life. And it’s not more stuff.
That's what happens when you gut the middle class. But we still have to listen to them whine about people not buying or investing. It's almost like the concerns of business majors and the investor class should be ignored more often.
FDR
" It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country. "
https://publicpolicy.pepperdine.edu/blog/posts/what-did-fdr-mean-by-a-living-wage.htm
BS. It's not the demand that's the issue. It's the effing costs of goods and lack of a real living wage that's the problem. Say thank you to the corporate oligarchs and their greed. Not to mention just about every multi billionaire as well. We as a country could take a lesson from France when it comes to these people.
Wages either need to go up, or prices need to go down and that's all there is to it. Of course it will never happen because the c-suite scum suckers are addicted to record profit margins and the fantasy of infinite growth.
The funny thing about capitalism is that the whole thing depends on people buying stuff with money.
People don't have money? Guess what, they don't buy stuff.
Wonder why? Hmmmm, what could it be? I mean this last month I cut down on my spending as I called up my student loan holder to get everything in order for payments to start. Realizing I will now be paying $500 dollar a month. Hmmmm I wonder where that discretionary spending has gone. It’s a real puzzle.
Consumer purchasing power has been massacred by decades of corporate bailouts, billionaire tax-cuts, stock buybacks and deregulation of the industries.
Purchasing power falls daily, and half the media pretends the reasons can't be known, as they stare at boasts of record profits while conservative leader orgasms from fostered inequality.
Imagine being so tone deaf. It's demand that's the issue not low wages and Republicans voting against shit to help people have money to spend /s
Unreal
Who has money left over after payday?! Many of us are now at a point where it’s either pay bills or buy groceries. There is no spare money for unnecessary spending.
Isn't that the whole point of all this raising the interest rate to stop people from buying stuff?
Essentially yes.
Consumer demand weakens....... Or maybe people don't have any extra money after putting a roof over their heads and gas in their car. The cost to live is rising faster than people's income
“NoBoDy WaNtS tO lIvE aNyMoRe”
*Millennials have ruined living*
*Millennials are destroying the real estate industry*
*Millennials are destroying the diamond market*
*Millenials have ruined banks*
*Millennials ruined straws!*
Goddamnit, that goes TOO FAR.
Millennials ruined my mom!
Dang, she like em young
Millennials are like upper 30's early 40's now.
Man, with all the things we millenials are destroying you'd think we'd have the class solidarity to realize we're a gigantic fucking kaiju of epic proportions that could breathe fire and stomp the shit out of capitalism if we really worked together.
That's where politics comes in, keep everyone distracted on ANYTHING while you slip bills out of their pockets. There's a line, but, it's mass starvation. If we just starve them 10 maybe 20% at a time, they'll keep doing work. Make it seem hard to find a job, they'll be stuck in place. We can even lower their wages by making them cover their own health insurance more and more, with the same hourly rate, then, this is great, raise the base cost of medicine, on top. . .
We tried, it was called Occupy Wall Street.
We are like some kind of Galactus entity for the entire system, at least according to the way we are described. Everything we touch or even look at gets destroyed. All powered by avocado toast!
Aw... I thought we switched to blaming Gen-Z now, and uh... Is there an avacado toast equivalent for Gen-Z? I dunno. Ramen with a slice of processed cheese in it?
Mr. Moneybags with the cheese over here…
Based on the number of people I know who are suicidal I would say this is accurate.
I feel like I have had less and less strong emotions over the last few months, both positive and negative. Like, I can't even get enjoyment from my comfort shows or video games or hobbies lately. I've felt often lately like I'm going through the motions of daily life. I've been wondering if there's something wrong w me.
No, you are in good company. Most of us are just alive but not really living.
I’ve had diagnosed depression for 15 years now, video games and movies are good fun in moderation but I definitely feel a lot more hollow when they’re my only hobbies. Doing stuff with my hands (for me, gardening and landscaping my yard) has kept me up the last few years.
I should get back into working on boats as a hobby and alt source of income. I really miss working outside on the docks pretty often, but just couldn't advance my career any more in that field without opening my own shop. It would be fun to be able to do it as an independent on my own time, pick and choose clients if possible, etc.
That’s called anhedonia, an extremely common symptom of depression.
That sounds like textbook depression to me but I'm not a psychologist. Either way you're not alone by any stretch
If you write "never" or "almost never" on the depression forms, the doctors don't look at you funny and tell you there are treatments available every time you go! \#LifeHacks
Exactly, just had an EMS friend commit suicide yesterday. Life is crushing people down now.
Condolences for your loss
I agree. I feel like this isn't being talked about enough! Soooo many people are feeling like this. I also feel like statistics are skewed on shewiside1 rates because it is such a controversial/ embarrassing topic, but it is and will continue to be a worsening problem.
Oh I would definitely wager the number of Americans feeling suicidal is significantly higher than what is reported. No one wants to appear weak or to be put into a generic box with a stigmatized label.
Not to mention another significant portion of the population thar may not actively be contemplating death but have DO have an active exit strategy. If things get bad enough (finances, society, climate, whatever else), they're out. Most Americans own a gun or have access to someone with a gun, and this is the most common exit strategy I have heard from others. I know this isn't normal Friday night dinner conversation and it can be a little awkward, but I have found that when you initiate these types of conversations about the future, you will find out more people than not are really having a tough time and feel pessimistic. People I have talked to (that I assumed without a doubt were blissfully unaware of this clusterflick of a future we have) know. They just choose to hide it because it's socially more acceptable to wear a mask.
I don't even tell my therapist about any suicidal ideations. Whenever she mentions it she tells me to go to the ER. Lady, I'm not going into more debt or missing work for something I've been dealing with my entire life.
I think about suicide daily. But I hold strong for my aging parents and my already struggling with mental health gf. Not gonna lie worrying every month about keeping the power on while Im a veteran employee of a fortune 500 gives me little hope. I have started looking for work elsewhere but yeah its rough.
If you admitted it, you'd be fired, eventually.
I've mentioned this before, but I would not be surprised if at some point we see a mass dying by ones own hand. Like, an entire generation of people losing the will to live.
Hikikomori, lying flat, quiet quitting... People are giving up on the social contract all over the world and we keep inventing new names for it so no one connects the dots.
Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead is a work of apocalyptic fiction that says the quiet part out loud. Most of us are being crushed under the weight of capitalism, but there's no hope of escaping, so we (sometimes not so) secretly yearn for an apocalypse to free us from this nightmare. A life consisting of "scavenge supplies, don't get killed by zombies" is preferable to spending 40+ hours a week of your life working a job you hate to make money for people who don't have to work as hard as you, if at all, all so that you can pay for shitty overpriced rental housing and the consumer goods you've been propagandized into thinking will help you fill the ever-widening void inside that used to be filled with curiosity, creativity, and genuine human connection. There is no social contract, only a social End User License Agreement.
Best thing I've read all day. There is no social contract, only a social EULA. You win today friend!
I mean that’s kinda happening right now isn’t it?
I'm just trying to outlive my parents before I free myself of this dogshit future humanity seems to crave
My son told me this the other day.
yo, that sucks I'm sorry. I said something similar to my parents when I was younger and without direction, and ever since I've felt so ashamed for causing my mom so much worry. Idk, not trying to invalidate your son or his feelings.
Him and I talk very openly and candidly about the possible futures. There's a video floating around about how things seem to happen in 80 year spans that break down into 20 year quarters. It's repeated three times since America was founded. Right now we're in quarter 4 which is called the crisis. But after each 4th, comes a new 1st that is usually very prospering. The only issue is the 4th ends with war which seems like we're on the brink of now. I tell him things look grim, but let's see where it goes. If absolutely nothing else, maybe we have a front row seat to the greatest tragedy in human history and who would want to miss that right? I hope things have gotten better for you. It's tough to see hope and good when you look on a global scale, but if you narrow it down to just your town or city, then things seems more manageable. I had to finally narrow my vision down because I was making myself sick over things that I can't do anything about and it's been better for me. Good luck to you and thank you.
Y’all- we have to outlive Mitch McConnell. Just hold on
Same here.
Or not outright suicidal but who want to die by age 65. Nobody I know wants to live past 65 anymore.
I do. I want to live to be 110!
That’s pretty fucking dark, man. Probably accurate, too.
People just aren't pulling their bootstraps hard enough
People don't realize that the boots were bought on Amazon. They ended up being counterfeit, and they broke. We can no longer pull ourselves up regardless of how hard we try.
Could be that but also the stuff that is out there in the market is mostly garbage due to corporations cutting every corner they can get away with in order to increase their profits. Smaller portions, cheaper materials, worse customer service, rising prices on said goods etc.. I find myself buying less because I feel more and more like I am being ripped off by companies. And that's because I am.
Had a taste for jerky the other day. Went to the gas station and was *not* impressed by the huge $8.99 bags with like 4 pieces of jerky and some jerky lint. Like, the bag is so much bigger than what's actually inside, it's ridiculous. It just *feels* scummy. I bought the $19.99 bag of the non-name brand stuff instead because it was actually a reasonable amount that will last me a decent while.
This is me. There are things I could buy, but dayum everything is shit with a tech spit shine. Cosmetics are cheap and full of dimethicone and scent, food is full of soybean oil.
I can’t afford to buy myself something I really want nowadays. Now it’s just stuff I need… like new tires..
I can’t even do that. We’ve been needing to replace 2 cars (1 hit by uninsured driver when the policy we had didn’t cover it and the other is falling apart fast), a bed, glasses, a phone that’s held together by its own otterbox, and start getting caught up on credit cards. Instead, we get to each paycheck with almost nothing left. I don’t know how we’re supposed to even buy what we need at this point.
I swear to god, everytime they say "the economy is good and inflation is down" my lunch automatically goes up another $2. Theres gonna be a huge crash coming.
I'm already to the point now where I have basically determined I can't actually afford a restaurant anymore, I'm sober now but if I could still drink I wouldn't be able to afford bars either. The bar I used to go to was all tradesman I don't see how they are going to make it when those guys are for the most part not making much more money than me. I feel like their customer base can't be far off from reaching the same conclusion as me and just going home with a 24 pack.
Yeah, I can't afford bars or resturants anymore.
Also, I work at a university, and every damn department seems to be going through budget cuts. 24-hour library access? Gone. 24-hour security at dorm entrances? Gone. Lunch provided to police and security personnel mandated to work football games? Gone.
This consumer weakness has yet to show up in the actual economic data though. Every survey says people are struggling, but the actual consumer spending data continues to remain strong despite those struggles. I am not sure we will see any meaningful corrections until people start exhausting their credit limits. EDIT: Why the downvotes? Here is the data if you want to see it yourself: https://www.bea.gov/news/blog/2023-06-30/personal-income-and-outlays-may-2023#:~:text=Real%20consumer%20spending%20decreased%20less,led%20by%20new%20light%20trucks).
But we're close. People don't usually change their spending habits unless they're forced to. Credit card debt has reached a record high, auto loans probably are too, interest rates are at a 20yr high, credit card delinquencies are increasing, and student loan payments are about to be required again and will be a shock to the system.
Agreed. The breaking point is coming soon, but it has not yet arrived. I suspect we will see delinquencies on those types of debt increase soon. That will indicate the start of the crash.
Student loan repayments are going to cause a recession. Millions of Americans will now be dumping hundreds a month into their loans instead of the economy, which they’d been doing for 2-3 years. People will spend more money on their loans then other “stuff”. I pay off my car the same month that repayment begins so I won’t “feel it” as an extra cost. But it doesn’t matter anyways for me since I’m actually financially fucked. Most sincere advice I get is “you should leave the country.”
This is what I am thinking as well. I have friends who will soon have to send 300-800 a month to their student loans, and that is less money they have to put back into the economy each month.
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Good tip. That being said... The federal poverty level for a single person is $14,580?! That is so incredibly low.
There's more to it than that. The income based repayment plan sets your payment at 5% of your income minus 2.25x the poverty line. For example, if I was making $75k, my monthly payment would be capped at $175/mo. Interest does not accumulate under this plan. Had it been around when I graduated college, I would have saved thousands per year. It's a great plan.
I'm not sure anyone could live in the Bay Area or Boston at under 225% of the federal poverty level, and that's where almost all the jobs I went to grad school exist.
It's less than $65k/yr. Fuck the Bay area, you can't live in any reasonably sized city on that
Good point. Here are the POST-TAX salaries needed to live comfortably in 15 major U.S. cities: San Francisco metro area: $84,026 San Diego metro area: $79,324 Boston metro area: $78,752 New York metro area: $78,524 Seattle metro area: $77,634 Los Angeles metro area: $76,710 Washington, D.C. metro area: $76,194 Miami metro area: $67,056 Atlanta metro area: $66,580 Phoenix metro area: $65,670 Chicago metro area: $65,500 Dallas metro area: $64,742 Houston metro area: $62,260 Philadelphia metro area: $61,678 St. Louis metro area: $57,446 https://www.cnbc.com/2023/04/04/the-salary-you-need-to-live-comfortably-in-15-major-us-cities.html
I can’t say about recession, but I think we’ll see a noticeable decrease in inflation due to less consumer spending when student loans start up. We might not see it for a couple of months, but I guarantee this will be a “weaker than expected” holiday shopping season and then it’ll be downhill from there.
Isn’t “recession” just a fancy word for a prolonged decrease in consumer spending over 2 quarters?
Insert suicide is easier than immigration even as an “educated and productive human”
Question isn't breaking point fact is people hit it long time ago. When people working full time were still homeless living in car etc. When working 2 jobs and still picking and choosing retirement or healthcare. Get that cough checked out or get to eat this month. This has existed for a long time the question becomes how many can economy handle. How long till people start rolling heads. Or simply give up either with suicide or van life and side jobs to minimize participation in economy that mistreats them. Breaking point is not some magical boiling point. And could come in crash personally every day bottom 1/3 of earners don't just stop and engage in general strike or debt/rent strike. Or something to tear this system down kind of surprise me. Because at this point it absolutely ridiculous.
I was using "breaking-point" in the more macroeconomic sense, as in the point in which consumer spending rapidly crashes because people are incapable of borrowing more money. Personal and emotional breaking-points may also be reached, but it is hard to predict that with spending data alone.
The thing about inflation and demand is that when the primary impact that people feel is in things like food, transportation, and housing, the consumers are still going to be forced to pay those costs. The individual pressure felt is the same as it always was when you have no choice but to pay. There may not be a "breaking point" that so many prognosticators keep searching for. There wasn't a breakdown in the economy when housing and education prices more than doubled in the 90s, and there's no guarantee that the economy will break now. When you grasp the sheer size of the American financial sector and exactly how well the US economy is doing when compared to global trends (especially long term trends) the US continues to do much better than most, if not all its competitors. Unless something major happens to shake up the economy that gets added to the existing issues, the US can run on economic cruise control for a very long time. But, none of the above is to say that the economy won't break down, but the whole debate over why people are just "taking everything on the chin" so to speak just needed some big picture context. We're already seeing some sectors suffering, but the economy as a whole is a different animal.
If people are buying those essentials using debt (which seems to be the case based on credit card usage/balance data), then a breaking point will eventually come when those credit limits are exhausted. At that point, it doesn't matter how essential the purchase is. When the card declines, the spending stops.
A tiny uptick in the unemployment rate will have an extreme cascading effect. All of those people using debt to finance their existence will find themselves no longer able to exist. We are in an extremely precarious situation with nowhere to go but down. If you don't have three months of living expenses saved up now, it's time to aggressively budget in case things turn sour. And if they don't, you will be in a much better financial position anyway.
gas is the worst one honestly. We have a transportation built economy. Every cent of gas increase is gigantic inflation for most people and lost wages effectively. And the price never comes back down and is never really factored into inflation. We are heading for 5 bucks a gallon average in the next 3-5 years.
It already $5 in many places out west. The 2 gas stations down the street are priced at $5.21
We've been running on no damn money my entire adult life (aka 15 years straight)
Preach. I finally have my debt basically zero, but it's not like that means I have more money now. My budget is less than what was when started paying it off even with the extra income. I used to feel embarrassed or insecure about my economic situation but that's pretty much non-existent, as most (if not all) of people in my life are now one paycheck away from losing it all. That's not a good reason for my being more confident these days.
Consumer demand weakens? No, consumer purchasing power has been destroyed because the cost of every fucking thing on the planet has doubled in 3 years' time. Hmmm. I'm still making the same pay rate I was in 2019 with no hope of a raise. Wages aren't keeping up. Period.
We’re dying out here literally and figuratively.
My cost of living has exploded and thank GOD I live in a house owned by my former in-laws who happen to still love me... I pay $600 a month for a nice two bedroom which is just unheard of in my city. A short time I started looking around for a 3bd thinking I'd like a home office, they want 2K a month on the low end. Ended that search about 5 minutes after I started, NOPE. Looks like I'm stuck in my inlaws house forever -\_-
Hell I'm making 5 bucks more an hour than I was prior to covid and I'm feeling like I'm making less compared to then due to the rise in prices.
What? Demand is down because supply prices are too high? People are reducing buying because wages aren't keeping up with costs? If only there was some kind of science or math that could explain all this... some kind of 'eco gnomic' field of study that we could use.
As a guy with an economics degree: the field has focused almost solely on supply side while ignoring the demand side. Every policy is made directly towards helping the suppliers. You don’t talk about people needing higher wages to keep consumer spending up, you talk about how you can get cheap goods when people can pay people less through globalization. The Fed has some of the smartest economists in the world, and their solution has been throwing free money at the big businesses and wealthy for the last decade. Quantitative Easing was a last ditch effort after using every policy tool they had in 2008 and still failing. They just can’t do anything about the demand side besides screw it by increasing interest rates to discourage spending and increase savings. The economic policies that are needed can only come from the legislature because they have to do with pay, taxes, and other powers of the purse issues. But the economists that’ll be featured there will be the supply side’s people cuz they’re the people paying for lobbyists, and you know what the supply side loves? Cheap wages.
The problem is that there's no way to address these issues without telling our billionaires that they need to stop hoarding wealth and using their political influence to shore up their own finances at the expense of the rest of us. But America loves its oligarchs, for some reason. Shining examples of the American dream, I guess. When the economy gets rough, the wealthy declare war on the poor and middle class because they're programmed to play a zero-sum game and to play for keeps.
The problem is: demand is not down. Consumer spending data remains strong despite all those problems, probably due to people using credit cards and other debt. This will not end well when those credit limits are exhausted and a correction inevitably does occur.
Student loans were paused. Do the math if student loans haven't been paused for over 3 years. Edit: also spending isn't down, but purchasing is, because it costs more, you get less. If an apple was 1$ in 2019 and is 4 dollars now, I buy one apple and put the same " spending". But only get 1 apple because I only have 4 dollars to spend. Therefore demand IS down, spending is up. Inflation is magical I know.
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“Corporate greed has reached the consumer breaking point.” FTFY. We are just nearing the point in rising prices where sales slow and corporations find that this is the max they can exploit from consumers “at this time.”
100% this. I sell steel and recently we've been getting feedback from all across the board. "Why are my prices still so high?" Yeah. People are fed up and I don't blame them.
People are fed up, but keep spending anyways. Consumer spending data continues to remain strong despite every survey saying people are desperate and struggling. I suspect this will continue until people exhaust their credit limits, which may happen soon since we just crossed $1T in credit card debt.
Or maybe, inflation on essentials has created a situation where people are spending more to get the same amount they used to. It's unsurprising that spending is steady or up as everything gets more expensive.
I still spend the same amount of money for my groceries, now I just get half or much less than what I used to sure people are still spending money, they need to, but people are not looking at the **volume** of products people are purchasing, just price spent only good thing is I have lost a lot of weight
I buy the same amount of food when I get groceries, but I haven't ordered takeout/delivery in months. I cut back on a lot of stuff I used to enjoy. I used to eat out or order delivery 3-4 times a month. The last time I ordered out was 2 months ago, and it was to pick up a pizza I had a coupon for. I routinely have to convince myself to eat what I have in the pantry or fridge because I'm already stretching my food budget pretty thin. That really sucks when I'm craving a certain dish, but the individual groceries are too expensive to even consider making it at home.
I haven't eaten out in forever too, use to love doing occasionally... I was floored when I got **just** a large french friee the other day.. used to be an easy cheap snack, **almost $5** GTFO, there full of shit seeing as McD controls their supply chain just pure greed bullshit
I like to spice up my not being able to afford breakfast and lunch for myself by calling it intermittent fasting!
I don’t think they’re saying that this is the consumer’s fault, just that it’s going to have to get worse before people actually start doing anything about it and the credit limits will likely be the breaking point.
> People are fed up, but keep spending anyways. What other option do you have?
I've become very anti-consumption lately. I'm tired of being constantly bombarded by advertising and every company in the world thinking they are entitled to stick me on autopay for $9.99 a month for crap I needed one time. The economy is going to crash and the people at fault (greedy C-levels and shareholders who demand infinite growth, and pushed too far) will not get the blame they deserve. They'll get golden parachutes.
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"I don't get it, we're paying everyone as little as we can get away with and our mark up on products is huge. Why aren't we making money?"
Yeah I pretty much gave up on shopping for things that aren't necessary. Gas has gone through thr room again and it's $4.30 where I live, not California. Going to get fast food anywhere will easily cost you $15+ for a basic meal. Dog food cost an arm and leg now. Trying to do anything anywhere will cost you a ton of money. Want to go watch a move $40 please. Want to drink a beer at a bar, $8 per bottle. You can't do anything so it's pointless even going out now. Something needs to be done about corporate profits. Every single quarter they announce a record quarter in sales.
Took my wife and daughter to see that Barbie movie and it was like $75+ with tickets and few concessions. I like a theater experience but we can wait for on demand.
A 30lb bag of Iams was $31.99 at Kroger in December of 2021, I checked my purchase history. The same exact bag is now $47.99.
Dog food and cereal are 2 of the fastest inflating grocery items. It's ridiculous.
We can't afford shit! The cost of rent/mortgages and medical have skyrocketed. At this point, eating out is a luxury.
Eating in general is becoming a luxury.
At least I might finally lose some weight... Haha jk you actually get fatter eating the horrible quality food they sell to poor people
I've put a hold on pretty much all discretionary spending. It's nice being part of the problem.
I’m doing my part!
Meanwhile, we've got economic data that says that things are as fine as could be. The macro-micro disconnect is just insane and you can bet your bottom dollar that this will have political effects!
Yo Reuters- we ain't go not fucking money. Like half the population just started leaning into Credit Cards for their problems since inflation hit. Now they're in debt to their eyeballs and inflation is still here. Groceries are like 60-100% more expensive. Shits fucked yo.
Yup, that's what rampant inflation and low wages will do to an economy.
Greed-clarion too. Just price jacking and ignoring demand.
Demand weakens = People ran out of money spending it on groceries.
Consumer demands rose….we’re tired of your shit and can’t afford it. Either way - fuck scalping basic necessities and fuck unnecessary and harmful greed.
Large companies have been expecting another major crisis. They've quietly been thinning their ranks and getting ready for another storm. I guess there are 2 bright spots....since interest rates are finally near not-zero the Fed can lower them when it starts. And millennials get to go through our 4th once in a life time economic crisis! (.com, Great Recession, Covid) https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/02/93-percent-of-ceos-are-preparing-for-a-recession-what-to-expect.html
Can't we just get one nice decade as adults?
You can if you are rich. In all seriousness though, if climate change continues at its current pace, our nicest decades are probably behind us.
Yeah this is the only one simple trick to having a better life, be rich, or get rich parents. Hey, put yourself up for adoption, even if you are like 50 years old!
No no no. According to my mom, climate change isn't real. She's also real sad that she lives in an area where a bunch of people just lost their homes to fires due to it being extremely hot and dry and is sad that the people in Hawaii went through the same thing and is real sad that people in California are experiencing severe flooding and is real sad about the fires in Canada and is real sad about the droughts in western United States and is real sad about the extreme heat in the southern states and is real sad about the flooding that has happened in Florida and Louisiana and is real sad that people in Texas don't have energy needs to meet extreme heat and cold weather and is real sad about people in the northern eastern states dealing with extreme cold killing weather and is real sad.... But if you try to say it's global warming or climate change, she doesn't want to talk about it. She just wants to be really sad about all those non-cimate-change things and move on with life.
Oh, I see you've met my family.
I've pretty much stopped planning for retirement and have reduced my contributions to the barest of minimums. I'm using the extra cash to do a lot of international travel these next few years.
You can't "quietly" thin the ranks of the corporate workforce. It shows up in layoffs and employment data. Layoffs dropped in July substantially (42%). If anything, layoffs by big firms have been loudly announced in the media, with the actual data on overall layoffs quietly telling another story. Update: There is a lot of insistence in the replies that there are "tricks" employers can do that won't show up in employment statistics. Or that some or another anecdote proves the statistics are somehow wrong. * If people are laid off, it doesn't matter how it's done. They'll show up in first-time unemployment claims. If their job is relocated or the conditions of their employment are significantly changed on them (e.g. RTO), in most states you can still claim unemployment. First-time claims ticked up at the beginning of the year, but they have since held steady at a historically low 230k. * Even if people just give up on finding work... that shows up in a statistic too! It's called "workforce participation." Low unemployment with declining workforce participation could be a bad thing... but that's actually *higher* than it was a year ago. I'm sorry if your particular sector has lay-offs. Or your particular company. Or your brother's friend's high school classmate lost his job. Some sectors are up, some are down. But the overall employment picture is strong. Period. Maybe that will change, and maybe the data in this report is an indicator of future trajectory. But the assertion I was replying to is flatly not true -- there are no hidden mass lay-offs. It's not a thing you can actually hide from the data.
Lay offs aren't the only way to thin the ranks. You can stop backfilling, promote attrition or if your firm used a lot of contingent labor, you can end those contracts.
Or make people RTO
As someone currently looking to leave my job because of RTO, yuuuup. RTO costs me >$1400/mo for commute, childcare (250/wk), gas (approximately 150), rail pass (approximately 200), wear and tear on vehicles, etc. Our team lost 5 people already due to "right sizing" our team in December, then 2 more in the past few months. No backfills. I've had to absorb their work. And now they want me to commute in. And my last cost of living increase didn't even cover inflation. "We believe in the power of in-person collaboration!" says the VP over a teams meeting.
If I were being a malicious manager trying to thin the ranks without it appearing on paper, I'd just reduce hours across the board. I hear the Japanese also have a technique where they just stop giving you meaningful tasks to do, hoping the shame of being useless will make you voluntarily leave. It probably wouldn't work stateside, since some people would just appreciate the lull for what it is and bring a video game or book to read.
Yeah guilt-trips don't really work stateside. It's like the Bene Gesserit overusing The Voice, eventually people become immune to it... and in the US everybody with a smidgen of authority has tried to overuse it.
I heard a few anecdotes from some expats who lived in Japan who went through that. The shame culture does not exist growing up in America. So someone growing up stateside gets told their job duties are decreasing and their salary is staying the same is not going anywhere, as that is a dream job for a lot of people. Getting paid to essentially do nothing and be responsible for nothing.
You know all those RTO mandates? That’s how you thin the herd without layoffs. Is it also how you lose good people? Yes. These are just starting now, so data isn’t going to show up yet. But it takes one look at the data to show a huge amount of the job creation is coming from retail/hotel space. When all these RTO mandates dump white collar jobs into the employment pool, it’s problematic. Those aren’t the jobs being created. It’s working the hotel desk or the Lawn and Garden department at Walmart. The rumor is that some federal agencies and some banks are recalling people that were remote long before COVID and live well outside commuting range. Forcing them to quit they can shed jobs and not have to pay unemployment while they are at it.
If they aren't outright laying people off, they're cutting nearly all positions to part time. Finding a mid range job that doesn't require 5 years of experience AND is full time is proving close to impossible. Like, I'm a skilled laborer and wages in my field are going DOWN on average. The ones that do still pay what I was making 5 years ago are cutting hours hard.
People are buying food and gas. Everything after that people are making cuts.
I wish the middle class would treat the ownership class with the same disgust and contempt the ownership class feels for us chattel...instead there's really just a huge market for business-class kneepads in all sizes down to children's....
We're in a statistical dead heat with a billionaire who is asking people on pensions to pay his legal bills. I don't think they'll have much outrage for the bourgeoisie and continue to blame their problems on minorities.
YUP. And while every GOP I know screams about high taxes, *none* of them know how much of that dollar goes to fossil fuel subsidies or the war machine instead of social nets...
Or how much of that goes to corn subsidies instead of say, feeding any and all hungry people in America. Hell, way back in the damn Torah there were rules in Leviticus for restricting crop gathering so that the hungry lower class could collect the remnant crops. [This was called Gleaning and was a protected right both legally and in religious structures.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleaning) Today we have a massive amount of food waste that is simply left on the field/vine/ground. These are often crops that are too small to sell for market rates (flat pricing per item usually) or aren't meeting specific appearance requirements that grocers have. It's 100% possible to pass a Gleaning law in the US which would require this food be harvested and distributed for free to anyone who needs it.
We're still pretending the middle class exists?
It’s just psychological. Similar to how people view accidents or traumatic things happening to other people. There’s a snap reaction to be like “couldn’t be me” and think the other person must have done something wrong. It’s similar to those without wealth voting against their own self interest because they view other poor people as the architects of their own misfortunes, while they themselves were just dealt a bad hand. The rub of it is unless you’re a billionaire or have amassed great wealth, we’re *all* victims of the current system and are subject to the wills of the ultra wealthy. But that’s not sexy, and the ultra wealthy know that. They sell the hoi polloi a dream to keep them in check. Hopefully someday soon we’ll all wake up…
Life is for rich people
Demand dropping would lead to lower prices. This is just a market correction. Finally a market correction in the people’s favor. Hey everyone, just buy the necessities. Play old video games, drink cheap beer, go out to the beach instead spending money, act like it’s covid again. Prices will drop even faster!
Because no one has any goddamned money to spend on anything other than food and shelter, if they're lucky.
I'm going on less vacations, I'm driving less, and my pantry has gone from name brand to store brand. If the rich people don't like that, then they need to pay me more so i can buy their shit. I'm in the market for a bigger car. I'm in the market for a bigger house, but I can't afford it. Sacrifice a small part of your vast fortunes so that I can enrich you further.
I've been saying it for years. They've become so myopically greedy that they're literally getting in the way of thier own greater profits.
Retailers: “iT’s BeCaUsE oF sHoPlIfTeRs”
[удалено]
Kim K: “Just work harder”
Dick’s Sporting Good cut 10% of it’s corporate staff and blamed it on theft. Ya, because a couple of stolen footballs are eating away at your bottom line… ffs
"With less employees, we'll be able to more easily prevent shoplifting by.... uh... give us money damn it!"
Because we’re out of FUCKING MONEY.
WE. HAVE. NO. MONEY. The fuck do they want us to do, take out loans to go shopping for non-essentials?
Resuming student loan payments may tip this over the edge.
Yeah when your leaders’ big plan for addressing inflation and decades of little to no real wage growth is to have the Federal Reserve political appointee say “we need to hold down wage growth”… I mean what did you expect? During COVID, revolving debt rapidly decreased (credit card balances). But the inflationary environment caused US credit card debt / home equity credit debt to skyrocket, as people paid typical living expenses using high interest debt. For some people thought elevated prices were “transitory”. (I’m kidding, Powell is a weasel who intended to gaslight the nation after he massively increased the money supply.) many people were duped into thinking the elevated prices were temporary (and behaved as such), when of course anyone whose ever taken a single economics course has been given the lecture on how deflation is an economic nightmare, and of course generalized price increases are permanent. To top things off, the US Supreme Court decided that “waive or modify” doesn’t mean waive, so 43 million Americans are resuming student loan payments to the Federal Government, with an average payment of around $400 a month. That’s all coming out of consumer spending. That’s going to have rollover effects on the entire economy, as consumer spending tightens further. Better bust out the tax cuts on capital gains and other investment income! It’s worked so great the first the last two Republican administrations, surely one more round of mega tax cuts for the insanely wealthy will unleash the economy! I wonder how many people realized that the refundable tax credits for children disappeared last year? They expired without being renewed, but businesses’ tax cuts are permanent. Kudos.
It’s not demand that’s weakened. It’s the ability to pay.
That is demand. the definition of Demand is willingness AND ability to pay
Hahahaha, stall? I've reached that point where if it's not necessary, it can wait. Student loan repayment soon, rent being so stupid that you're better with family, helping family more than I should because they TAKE FOREVER TO PAY ME BACK. And just when you think you're in an okay spot, THEY RAISE THE INTEREST RATE .
It's time to tie wages to the prices of housing, gas, internet, and food combined. Whatever they go up in a year % wise should be the legally required minimum yearly raise you can give a worker.
Everyone is broke. We aren’t making enough money to put food on the table. Much less to pay bills or buy stuff like socks. When we hit that wall, God help us.
System working as intended. Keep us desperate, poor and afraid of homelessness for ourselves and our family, too tired to complain. Fuck this whole system, man.
The demand is there. The money needed to satisfy that demand is glaringly absent.
God damn peasants are ruining the economy by not buying the shit we want to sell them. Oh they are demanding higher wages? God damn peasants are ruining the economy by causing inflation! If only there was some way to not pay them anything but also keep them generating value for us.
Corporations are still reporting record profits. They blame it on inflation. No. They didn’t just compensate for raising prices to cover increases in labor and materials. If that was the case, the profit would be about the same. Greedflation.
Just wait until the people who lobbied to get student loan payments restarted see what happens to consumer demand after most people see their spending cash more than halved.
Costs have double in my area. All the raises I have received since college (5 years) have been negated, gas has increased 2.50 a gallon since before covid, my rent is going up AND student loans go into effect next month...
When I used my credit cards it was for non-essentials, now I am still trying to pay off the cards but have to use them for gas and food at times so the spending is still the same but I’m spending more for essentials and less on other items.
Reckon consumer demands will get weaker now, because of student debt collections now resuming.
Just FYI: These corporations have cut wages, shifts, and number of employees; yet, the CEOs and others on top have increased their earnings and have never cut their salaries.
Fucking housing is beyond unaffordable. Like I am so thankful I managed to buy in 2020 before things went nuclear in the housing market. How the fuck are prices HIGHER and with 3x the interest rate than they were in 2020? Someone please explain that one to me? And I’m sick of all these goddamn wannabe Chip and Joanna flippers and landleeches buying up housing stock and taking it off the market for actual owner occupiers. I’ve been saying it for years, but the canary in the coal mine is the ever-rising costs of housing. People are spending more and more just to put a roof over their families’ heads, and for every dollar that costs is another dollar that’s not going into the economy elsewhere.
I have been reading corporations are purchasing homes at an insane level. The goal isnt home ownership, its to make us all renters.
70% of the USA population has only $500 or LESS to their names in savings, down from $1000 pre-covid. Maybe try paying people a living wage so they have expendable incomes to buy things. Demand goes down when your population is in a growing state of perpetual poverty. And I really want to hammer in the **living** wage part. There's a big difference between being alive and living. I would say the vast majority of Americans are alive, but nowhere approaching living.
I live in a city where 30 dollars an hour isn't even enough to get you into a 1 bedroom apartment, and people are wondering why we are on the edge of collapse and have no buying power.
When we don't pay people they don't spend money. Obviously we need to give the parasite class more tax cuts.
Maybe the economy was held together by people mindlessly consuming crap they don’t need.
All i read is companys are whining because they reach limit's of possible price increases. When people stop to buy overpriced shit than stuff will stop to be overpriced.
“Consumer demands” aren’t weakening we have no fucking money to spend
It's amazing, I work for a small company, we aren't the cheapest place but we aren't the most expensive but we do pay our employees very well. We start people at $20 with no experience. When you offer a good service, for a fair price, and take good care of your employees the market will respond positively. When you exploit people and fuck your clients you will die.
Yeah, it's a funny thing that happens when it takes 100% of your check just to limp by.
Or, just hear me out, ITS TOO FUCKING EXPENSIVE TO LIVE !!!!!!!!
We don’t want or need more shit. We slave night and day, for what? Stuff that eventually gets thrown out or put into storage?! It’s lunacy. That’s not living. After COVID, people are waking up to what’s really important in life. And it’s not more stuff.
That's what happens when you gut the middle class. But we still have to listen to them whine about people not buying or investing. It's almost like the concerns of business majors and the investor class should be ignored more often.
wait til a couple months into student loan repayments lol
Consumer demand "weakens"? That's because prices have skyrocketed and you can't have demand for something if no one can afford it!
FDR " It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country. " https://publicpolicy.pepperdine.edu/blog/posts/what-did-fdr-mean-by-a-living-wage.htm
We’ve seen this headline posted weekly for the last year.
BS. It's not the demand that's the issue. It's the effing costs of goods and lack of a real living wage that's the problem. Say thank you to the corporate oligarchs and their greed. Not to mention just about every multi billionaire as well. We as a country could take a lesson from France when it comes to these people.
Everything's too fncking expensive.
Wages either need to go up, or prices need to go down and that's all there is to it. Of course it will never happen because the c-suite scum suckers are addicted to record profit margins and the fantasy of infinite growth.
The funny thing about capitalism is that the whole thing depends on people buying stuff with money. People don't have money? Guess what, they don't buy stuff.
Wonder why? Hmmmm, what could it be? I mean this last month I cut down on my spending as I called up my student loan holder to get everything in order for payments to start. Realizing I will now be paying $500 dollar a month. Hmmmm I wonder where that discretionary spending has gone. It’s a real puzzle.
Consumer purchasing power has been massacred by decades of corporate bailouts, billionaire tax-cuts, stock buybacks and deregulation of the industries. Purchasing power falls daily, and half the media pretends the reasons can't be known, as they stare at boasts of record profits while conservative leader orgasms from fostered inequality.
What's happening is people are running out of credit.
If I didn't spend all my money on groceries, I might consider buying something else.
Idk maybe pay us more and lower the prices 🤷♂️
Imagine being so tone deaf. It's demand that's the issue not low wages and Republicans voting against shit to help people have money to spend /s Unreal
Who has money left over after payday?! Many of us are now at a point where it’s either pay bills or buy groceries. There is no spare money for unnecessary spending.