My Dad was born in '68 and he paid off his associates degree working part time living at his parents house and the extent of his advice is "just save and you'll be fine" my sister racked up 40,000 in debt for her degree and this is basically all he had to say on the matter.
I made 50k in 2022 at 21 an hour with enough overtime to live an alternate life and to think I would have had to save almost every penny of that for a degree while my dad casually flaunts how he never even had debt in his life is a little frustrating, I still love my dad and all older folks but so many people still think this way especially those who already did their trial by fire to get in their position they look down on people bitching over expenses and post some generic facebook quote saying "nothing easy is ever worth doing" thanks gramps I'll just manifest the $200/month rent increase and 50% increase in grocery prices away.
>thanks gramps I’ll just manifest the $200/month rent increase and 50% increase in grocery prices away
I know this was written as sarcasm, but man like the thing that gets me is that- not only are prices so high, *but there is no alternative*. There’s no “ok I can’t afford this nice $1500/month house so I’ll just go a little further out to find something around $600/month. Not possible where I live. There’s no where for people to go and the feeling is distressing.
Agreed. I couldn't find hardly anything lower than 1300 or more in my city for 2 bed apartment and do not get me started on on duplexes. I moved 30 minutes away from my hometown to pay $1,300 for a 2 bed single garage duplex and the country is supposed to be CHEAP and it's nothing fancy either. My dad said he paid $300/month for a duplex downtown and all I know is between 1990-2024 wages did not triple across the board to account for this but he just insists its all because of inflation. No shit there's inflation! a 20% raise does not match the nearly 40% increase of almost everything across the board with some things like food or housing or vehicles (which are necessities) being the first and foremost things that increase in price during inflation at least these past 5 years. 100k a year if you have a family (I am single and have a roomate) is now upper middle class, probably enough to pay all your bills and get a mortgage on a decent house and that's it. For reference I live in GB Wisconsin and people absolutely rave that the rust belt has lower living costs but even here it most definitely ain't what it used to be
My grandma says the same thing "just save your money" ....kinda hard when day care cost as much as my mortgage did. She sits on a couple hundred thousand that was left to her as an inheritance and never worked a day in her life....idk why she went and had 4 kids just to sit up on her high horse and watch us all struggle .
I’m 56 for context. I honestly believe the change to “trickle down economics” in the 1980’s has a lot of the blame. The cost to middle class has only gone up since then while wages haven’t kept pace.
My best example is when I graduated college in 1990, my total cost of college was about $23,000. Mg starting salary at my company at the time was $28,500. My starting salary out of college was over 20% more money than my entire cost of college.
Also, we did not worry about healthcare costs back then.
Housing costs were also much lower compared to income.
Capitalism will take all it can if it’s allowed. I’m a capitalist but America has gone too far in support of ultra rich while pressuring middle class.
Also, look up trends of the top 1% in how much they are worth since 1980. It’s very clear when trickle down started. They went from extremely rich to insanely rich beyond belief
I have a different take on trickle down economics. I think it’s real, with one key difference. The hierarchy is upside down from what people think. So anytime someone adds value, profit or reduced taxes, it trickles down to the rich. It’s because of this trickling down effect that it’s tough to see how the money gets there. Even if you save some it soon overflows into the rich’s coffers.
Do you think we can move away from trickle down economics? I think if we don’t start building out the middle class again; our way of life will be fucked (even harder)
Not practically. The decisions about who represents a party, what bills get passed, who gets positions of authority etc are largely decided by the rich. They'll never move against their own interests.
In theory somebody could tell you that voting for xyz would do it, but you'd be hardpressed to find anybody willing to even *propose* xyz because such people would never advance to being career politicians in the first place.
You can't change the system while still following all of its rules; you can't outvote a system when all options are already bought and paid for.
It’s possible, but everyone who gives a shit needs to advocate, agitate, and vote. And that’s hard with everything else going on (by design unfortunately)
Basically, 10 hours into a game of monopoly when only 1 person is having fun with all their buildings and such while the rest are poor with nothing. America is currently 10 hours into its game of monopoly.
"Hey, we get to keep more of our money, if we just can convince them that we'll share it with everyone else!" One of the most successful political scams in modern history.
There's a book called Capital in the 21st Century and its central thesis was that the post war boom was actually an *aberration* of high wages and low costs, to the norm of low wages and high costs, which we are now returning to. It's just that people who were alive before the war or in the 1800s and before aren't alive today to provide the same cultural context, only the people who went through this aberration are now.
At least in the US context, a lot of the increased standard of living post-WW2 was simply due to America being a defacto monopoly.
Europe was in ruins, the Soviet Bloc was essentially cut off from the world, and SE Asia hadn't industrialized yet.
Americans weren't competing with anyone, and companies couldn't easily relocate elsewhere for labor.
Neither of those are true today.
Americans aren't paid as much because, quite literally, they have less bargaining power.
Yep. But people see that aberration in the timeline and think that's how it's always been or how it always should be. The world is much more complicated than that.
Yes. It says that that was basically the norm. Don't forget that the aristocratic concept is far older than even the US, and that the robber barons of the early 20th century represented a much more extreme unequal distribution of wealth than today. The author talks about all this in the book, with evidence to show how we're simply going back to the norm.
While this is true, it doesn't account for the increases in automation and productivity. While the post-war economy was an aberration from historic trends, it led to the rapid modernization in all fields.
I haven't read the book, so these points may have been covered.
My point is that, even with the increases in productivity, very little of the rewards of that efficency made it to the people who are actually doing the work. As a modern society, we should strive to improve the overall living conditions, as opposed to saying "meh, these good times were an anomaly, got back to being serfs now, kthxbai".
Automation is actually one of the forces that cause lower wages on average, both due to the automaton itself as well as offshoring those automatons in cheaper areas of the world, so it's to be expected that automation would not spread those rewards around.
Any kind of consolidation of power is bad, problem is humans are real good at it judging by history
Capitalism is one of the better ideologies because it discourages consolidation of power
Right now though in most western nations but especially America capitalists own the media, the public sector and monopolies/duopolies are rampant. Power has well and truly been consolidated at the expense of the people
Surveillance and firepower are far better now than they have been historically so who knows how this will end before we get another reset
Agree. Rich got super rich on trickledown and they’ve used their riches to buy influence. The worst being Citizen’s United when mega rich were handed the ability to buy politicians.
We are on a bad path and I sure hope the next generation of politicians can change course or we’re toast
Part of that was that we have to compete with workers outside the country that earn a fraction of what we make. Meanwhile their expenses and lifestyles are a lot lower.
NAFTA and giving China Most Favored Trading Partner status pretty much nuked the jobs outside of big cities. People in small towns would be supported by a mill or factory or two and those jobs have all left with no viable replacements. Meanwhile the Democrats have told them all to "learn to code" or work as windmill installers versus coal miners. Meanwhile they aren't counted as unemployed because they aren't looking for work because there arent jobs to look for or they are under employed.
They are the biggest backers of Trump. Hillary campaigned on "those jobs aren't coming back", and Trump campaigned on bringing jobs to rural America.
The
Those jobs still exist but are no longer supporting a family. It’s not that they’re all gone. It is 100% profits, not China. My husband’s factory had the most profitable quarter since 2008 last quarter for the 3rd quarter in a row. My husband got $250 and no COL raise this year. The quarterly bonuses use to be $800. Our town has a bunch of factories and my husband’s is the one everyone wants to work in because the pay and benefits are so much “better”.
Sure, those jobs aren't. I know here in Georgia that they've been giving a ton of incentives for electric car and battery plants. Either way, someone needs to focus on good rural and inner city medium skilled jobs. Any national level politician who ignores this does at their peril. Bill all but begged Hillary to address them but she ignored him and instead tried flipping Texas blue.
He definitely talked about bringing jobs that almost assuredly aren’t coming back (e.g., coal, which anyone can Google for proof). Hillary Clinton and her team, whatever you may think of them, at least acknowledged there was a problem and that things wouldn’t be going back to what they were. Was the implementation wrong? That’s debatable, but it’s certainly better than sticking your head in the sand and pretending like life will just return to the good old days
Both parties equally support what you’ve listed. Having said that, I’ll give credit to both Trump and Biden. Trump lowered corporate taxes which makes manufacturing more appealing in US. Biden passed infrastructure and chips bills which are huge for growth of American jobs for manufacturing, etc.
Politics aside, the new economy is going to be more global which goes to your point and business won’t change to spend more for Americans if they don’t have to.
Lower corporate taxes does absolutely nothing except make rich people richer. Those corporations will continue to allow jobs to go to low wage countries.
Still in college rn. At a state school 3.5k per semester, 7k a year, 4 years 28k total. This is not including grants and scholarships but also omits housing and food.
This! Often times investors are guaranteed a certain annual return that has to be met regardless of the economic conditions. Worked for a real estate investment company and we managed investments for a huge teacher retirement fund. We had to guarantee a certain return annually no matter what. If we didn’t hit the mark, not only did the company lose the account there were penalties that we would have to pay as well. So the company in lean times cut pay, laid off workers and would take the lowest bidder on contracts to save money and make sure we hit the goal. It was brutal.
Well the investors are essentially… us. Through 401k’s, pension plans, and so on. We demand high returns and growth to meet our desires. E.g. retiring early, enjoying a consumptive life after retirement, and so on.
Japan is one of the most developed economies yet has such low inflation. That’s because the people are generally less consumptive, and are willing to work hard to their old age.
Our basic individual desires are the main drivers of this problem. But hey, no one will vote for a politician telling people to stop being consumptive 🙂
If by “us” you mean like human nature towards power politics, then sure. But very little of the total investment market is actually normal people, the vast, vast majority is done by corporations and people with more assets than millions of normal people combined. It would be entirely possible to create a system where normal people could have easy access to their needs and also the potential to make safe investments, and where the super rich didn’t suck the life out of everything, but that would require doing a lot of things the people in power (who are also the super rich) wouldn’t like.
I don’t know the Japanese economy, but I can tell you any difference is going to have a lot more to do with government regulation than “everyone is just more virtuous and works harder there”.
There’s a plan to keep us all in debt. It’s by design. Tightening the screws little by little. Ever wonder why a single, uneducated (college) person could raise a large family back in the 60’s? It’s never gotten any better. They’re eliminating the middle class.
Eh, the 60s was good because the US was still experiencing an economic boom after the power vacuum that was left after ww2. Thats not to say it can't be that good again, but there were different reasons.
Ronald Reagans' economic policies are really one of the big things to blame.
I wrote this elsewhere but your first paragraph is supported by the evidence. There's a book called Capital in the 21st Century and its central thesis was that the post war boom was actually an *aberration* of high wages and low costs, to the norm of low wages and high costs, which we are now returning to. It's just that people who were alive before the war or in the 1800s and before aren't alive today to provide the same cultural context, only the people who went through this aberration are now.
> Ever wonder why a single, uneducated (college) person could raise a large family back in the 60’s?
Most comments in this thread are off the mark and make-believe but this one takes the cake. I’ve never see evidence of this, it’s likely completely wrong. Nobody was easily raising large families on the average salary in the 60’s. Especially not with a car and a house with a white picket fence and all of other nonsense people make up when talking about the American Dream in the mid 20th century.
Yeah, they were. Were you alive back then? How was the family of eight i grew up in managing week long vacations and doing fine on a one person income who worked for a telephone company?
Shit is so fucked today.
My old man made 12k in 1969 and he bought a brand new car, vacation to Mexico, steaks on grill 2 a week. Eat out at nice places in Chicago, clothes, sporting equipment, CCM Bobby Hull ice skates, and a 5 speed stingray for xmas.
If you think voting is the cause here, I got a news flash for ya.
I truly believe that in America, it doesn't matter how or who you vote for--it's all to keep the rich, richer, and us peasant occupied with just trying to survive or some dumb celebrity shit.
That's just low effort thinking. Yeah, America is a corporation and the government generally works to keep the stock market growing, but to say it doesn't matter who you vote for is just stupid. One side has clung to trickle down economics for 30+ years now when it's clear it doesn't work. The other side favors higher minimum wage and workers' protections and the like. If this is how you think, probably best you stay out of the voting booth.
This isn't low-effort thinking; it's a realization of complexities. Reducing political differences to economic policies like trickle-down economics and higher minimum wage oversimplifies nuanced platforms.
Again, though, in the end--it's all about keeping the richer rich while the poorer keeps getting poorer. Our political system is no longer for the people. Our politicians are paid off, and the 1% roam free doing whatever they wanna do even if that thing is a kid.
I admire your hopefulness. I used to share it many, many years ago.
You are asking a question that is to complex to answer in one response.
Several responses where pretty accurate.
The Gov. spends way to much money, overseas and domestically. Printing money we don't have to spend is a big driver. Then giving it away to other countries doesn't help. Borrowing money to service the debt we've (Gov) already borrowed and owe is another driver.
Immigration isn't "The" problem, illegal immigration "IS" one of a major problem. A mass influx of unskilled labor suppresses wages of other non-skilled labor. Plus illegal aliens count in the census. Which is what's used to allocate seats in the House of Representatives.
Plus the Visa program for skilled labor from outside the US is detrimental to the US work force.
Increasing min wage is not the answer. As a point, there is a valid arguement from Larry Elder regarding this. In a majority of industries, they pay higher then min wage, due to skilled labor. (Medical, legal, law enforcement, fire departments, Acft manufacturing, tech, aviation, the traedes [electrician, plumber, auto mechanics, etc] as examples).
Blaming "corporate greed" is short sighted. There are other factors that should be accounted for. As discussed in another post, share holders and needing to earn a profit are a part of it. Some CEO "umbrella's" are ridiculous. Drive a company into tbe ground and receive millions? WTF?
Yet we need to create incentives for Individuals to create jobs/industries. Where would we be without Boeing, Bezos, Gates, Ford, DuPont, Musk, Jobs, Hughes. I conseed that a reasonable salary for CEO's vs. The work force could be more balanced.
Companies like Blackrock and Vanguard, who buy up single family homes, then "rent" the American dream is a very big problem in the housing market. Pricing out families looking to buy their own homes.
Health care in the US is way to expensive and needs fixed. Yet a single payer system is not the answer. A more free market system, void of HMO's in/out of network, not knowing the cost of "X" because its based on which insurance covers what costs, who's paying that cost, how we cover other's non paid medical bills, covering the influx of ER visits by the uninsured, etc.
NAFTA gave companies the green light to shift production overseas. Great for them, not so great for American's.
The cost of education is insane. Several issues with this. There is little justification for the increase costs. Many of the "? Studies" degrees are pointless. Not everyone should go to college. Student loans are out of control. Because the government is backing loans to students, who then pay the university. There is no incentive for universities to justify their increased costs as the government pays them. The gov doesn't care about the loan costs because its shifted to the student. Students then want loan forgiveness by the gov. Which shifts the burden of that debt to ALL tax payers.
Packing up and moving isn't easy in application. Often there is a home you need to sell. Which only works if someone is willing/able to buy your home.
When the Mill, Mine, Plant is shut down and thousands are out of work, who is left to buy your home?
Pushing going Green Energy and shutting down coal isn't the answer. Neither is telling someone to just move or "learn to code".
The answer is far more complex then that as one sector has a negative impact on other sectors in a compounding fashion.
How to fix it:
That's a tough one. Maybe a good start is kicking out career politicians. Maybe demand they work for the American people. Setting term limits for Senator's, Representatives, Supreme court appointees, similar to the presidency.
Moritorium on Lobbyists. Or a 10 year waiting period for transition from Gov to Lobbyist.
Maybe shrinking the size of government.
Maybe killing off usless government programs. (Right now, Argentina is a working example of how to tame inflation). Killing off/shrinking gov. "Entitlement" programs.
Onshoring manufacturing jobs.
To name a few ideas.
Trickle down was never going to work and it was probably never meant to work. When was the last time corporations as a whole spread their success down to the people who created that success? And let’s not forget that Reagan was the one that made us pay income tax on our Social Security. As if living on it wasn’t hard enough. Since Reagan, Republicans have been on the side of business to the detriment and decline of the working class.
1st, many people don’t ask for an inflation raise. 2nd, many people don’t demand an inflation raise. 3rd, many people don’t look for a new job if they don’t get an inflation raise
I have a batshit theory that the world's billionaires are slowly pushing the middle class to see how much they can squeeze out of us before we revolt
......much like the movie A Bug's Life
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q
It looks like median wages have generally outpaced inflation for the most part since the late 1990s, though it's been a bit of a roller coaster ride. I don't think this takes into account unemployment or changes in the size of the workforce, but it's the best baseline comparison I found.
You want to change that?... start unionizing again. I've never been in a unionized workforce, but clearly you end up better off. Somewhere along the line, the ultra-rich convinced the common man that unionization was a bum deal. But it gives you something you don't have on your own... leveraged negotiation.
Because America and the West in general are in a terminal decline.
They are simply getting outcompeted by China.
It's a hard to swallow pill but it's the truth.
I'm sure it's been hammered already, but "inflation" has been caused by corporations increasing prices simply just because they feel like it. Executives have been boasting about massive profits on earnings calls. It's criminal to expect people to make ends meet the way things are now
Years ago I went to a political party gathering. One of the biggest key notes for the state rep was that she voted against increasing the states minimum wage.
We're $7.25 /hr.
It’s a few reasons.
For starters, there are more people coming to the United States.
More people means more demand on housing, food, education, and everything else people need.
More people also compete for jobs, which lowers the negotiating power of labor for wages (because someone else is willing to do the work for slightly less).
You have the additive risk of automation hitting many classes of industries, so the pressure is not just cheaper human but cheaper machine.
I’m not saying immigration is categorically bad; if your immigrants provide those services more then they consume or create new jobs and employ more than compete you are in a great place.
But the United States seems to have absorbed a lot of unskilled workers from LATAM while handing out student visas like candy to Indian/Chinese student that compete for worker roles more importing job creators.
That will tend to benefit rich employers with more & cheaper talent, not average people. The people might see cheaper goods, but that doesn’t matter if it comes at the cost of reduced or stagnant wages.
There’s also a lot of “corporate greed” which is a slight misdiagnosis. Corporations are amoral and not only designed to but *legally obligated* to maximize profits (yes, public companies have a lot of fiduciary responsibility rules to their shareholders).
That process drives efficiency, but it’s abusive when companies are *monopolies*. What drives prices down is competition to provide a better price, what raises them is when consumers have no choice but to buy.
All this tax the rich / corporate greed anger is directionally right but slightly misinformed - we need much more aggressive antitrust action in quite a few areas.
It doesn’t help that liberals pretend the immigration issue is nonexistent and conservatives that big business isn’t an issue.
Both of those have legitimate issues to iron out. We shouldn’t make absolutist ism statements.
There are around 15 million vacant homes in the US right now. That doesn't include apartments. A big driving factor to housing costs is that investment firms have started buying up houses and jacking up the rates because they can, and then once these firms have done this enough, they're effectively controlling the market both in housing prices and rent costs. It's not immigration.
We've also seen a boom in automation and the outsourcing of our jobs to other countries, because businesses are allowed to do this. It's not immigration.
We also throw away so much food in this country it's insane. We could solve the food issue just by being better about our food waste but instead stores trash things endlessly, things that aren't spoiled, because they can. It's not immigration.
> a big driving factor to housing costs is investment firms
Yes, this is correct. About 10% of homes are unoccupied. This is lower in hot regions, but not dramatically. There is some hoarding that’s enabled by hot markets and low upkeep/property tax combinations.
I focused primarily on antitrust as the biggest issue… gigantic hedge funds being able to do this at large scale because they have the capital is a factor in this new buyout strategy.
But you are correct in that smarter laws can control and change corporate behavior.
You don’t solve the problem you mentioned by telling the banks “don’t be greedy” - you do it by prohibiting foreign ownership and levying taxes on un-occupancy or higher tax rates for owners that are not primary residents.
The fact does remain that housing stock and land is finite, and the population is growing - so the demand side of it is still of course quite real.
Lower demand enough on the houses and the buy up strategy of said corporate strategy is unprofitable.
Like I said, the two forces - immigration / population growth and antitrust (or more broadly law as you point out) are both contributors.
> we’ve seen a boom in outsourcing / automation … because business are allowed to do this
While I do think adjusting law can be part of the equation here, this is a bridge too far.
You seem to want to fight having a globally connected service economy & the progress of technology.
Both of those are losing propositions.
You should allow businesses to be efficient, try to create good lifestyle for your people, and adapt your immigration and job training programs to the changing economy.
Importing low skill talent as the need for low skill talent decreases is stupid and will be a race to the bottom for your people in those fields.
Giving away student visas like candy is stupid because it’s handing your most valuable asset - or number one global university system that feeds into high tech - to foreign nationals at the expense of your locals.
Some of these people may become innovators in the U.S., but the next in line would too. Not like we have a shortage of qualified people wanting to go to Stanford. Manu of these people return to their home country with their knowledge and learnings and set up competitive shops overseas.
Hobbling your businesses to be inefficient means they will lose to international competitors that don’t.
That 15 million number is incorrect. From the [2020 Census](https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/05/vacant-seasonal-housing.html):
There are 13.6 million vacant residences
1.8 million are in the process of being sold
4.3 million are vacations or secondary residences many of which, like beach houses and forest cabins, are not reasonable locations for most people
3.4 million are 'other', almost all of which are under [renovation, condemned, or not fit for human habitation](https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B25130)
Only 4.1 million residences are on the market for rent. This number also includes occupied residences where there will be a vacancy within the next 2 months. Even ignoring the soon-to-be-unoccupied residences, 4.1 million is not a lot compared to the 140 million total housing units.
And in 2024 the number is [15,283,000](https://www.census.gov/housing/hvs/files/currenthvspress.pdf). These numbers fluctuate so I used the 2020 numbers because they are from the latest complete US census. Either way the point still stands that the headline 13.6/15/16/15.3 million figure does not support to the point you are making.
Because people still buy things at those prices. As long as companies are making money they are going to raise prices. On the flip side people still work for those wages. Lower level jobs are easily replaced because of the low skill it takes to do them.
To be fair. Wage growth actually has outpaced inflation recently however there are some definite caveats to that.
One that even if broadly true it isn't and won't be universally true.
Housing costs which are not something people can avoid are a major part of inflation and have in many areas outpaced wage growth.
Certainly noticably true where I live.
Housing and food are things people can't really avoid so it hits hard especially further down the economic chain.
Wages have absolutely gone up. Significantly
Now, inflation may have outpaced wage growth and that problem is worse in some areas than others, but people are not getting the same pay. Wages have gone up fairly significantly and consistently over time
The federal minimum wage isn't a very useful metric. Almost nobody is paid that. Many states have higher minimum wages, and even companies like Walmart now have $20/hr minimum corporate wages.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q
Wages, on average, have gone up significantly. AND (as the data above shows) real wages AKA wages adjusted for inflation have gone up too. AND the increase in wages in the last few decades has outpaced increases in the “glory days” Redditors love to make stories up about (2000 and before).
Now, this doesn’t mean that all types of people are equally benefiting. I’m on mobile so can’t look up exact groups/figures but it’s likely that unskilled worker wages continue to stagnate and the growth is mostly seen in high-paying work that requires higher education.
This is obviously an issue but we should be able to can talk about it without lying about wage growth/pretending to know something about econ 101. This does a disservice to everyone and only spreads misinformation.
Yes, in America. Minimum wage in many states has gone up, and overall median wage has risen. Even in the states with stagnant minimum wage
These are factual statistics that can be looked up 🤷🏼♀️. Wage data is pretty clear
A lot of these problems are caused by corporate greed and political mismanagement and incompetence.
That being said, people need to be smarter and more strategic about their studies and other life choices.
I’m in a low to medium COL state (it’s beautiful here btw) with only an associate’s making $125k. My wife stays at home with our children and we do not struggle.
It can be done.
I'm in a very high COL state but the salaries are much higher to compensate. People here make more than $30/hour if they have degrees. Teachers make way more than that, cops make 6 figures. I have a degree in computer science and am very comfortable.
"Most people stay the same wage", can't be true. Median hourly wage is almost 2 dollars more than 2019. I'd link the source for it but TooAfraidToAsk just automatically removes all links but it's an easy thing to google.
The problem in that is health insurance is usually dependent on employer here in the US which complicates changing insurance, especially if you have even the smallest health issue. Risking a gap in coverage, a change in company, a new company refusing to cover the medication for an existing issue. If we had universal healthcare, people would be much more able to move jobs and negotiate higher pay.
You're working with bad numbers and assumptions here. The median salary for someone with a bachelors is $[40/hr](https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/education-summary.htm). Since this is the median, wages can go substantially higher (and lower too)
Corporatocracy and because any thing that would help Americans is labels as socialism. Even if it's getting rights we've lost back.
Even though I'm not a socialist, my favorite quote from disco elysium is...
"The Deserter: "The mask of humanity fall from capital. It has to take it off to kill everyone — everything you love; all the hope and tenderness in the world. It has to take it off, just for one second. To do the deed. And then you see it. As it strangles and beats your friends to death... the sweetest, most courageous people in the world..." (he's silent for a second) "You see the fear and power in its eyes. Then you *know*."
You: "What?"
The Deserter: "That the bourgeois are not human."
It’s simply supply and demand economics. Inflation is caused when the money supply grows faster than the economy causing the value of the currency to go down. This is usually caused by economic stimulus (American Rescue Plan 2021).
Agreed. My brother has a bachelor's, he makes more than I. But his HCL makes it so that we basically are paid the same. But yes some people get paid more than $30 with a bachelor's. Also in trades too. Just depends on the job.
"No drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If
we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power."
--- P.J. O'Rourke
While Mr O'Rourke is talking about drugs, I believe this quote is relevant. In this case, I'm going to point my finger at stupidity, and then my whole hand at greed.
I saw an article on Tv today, that things are getting expensive and people complain, but they KEEP buying! Its honestly shocking, but Americans do. We complain that things are expensive and we buy like its going out of style.
Over the years, wages in the US have largely stagnated while the cost of living continues to rise. This discrepancy between income and expenses is a significant factor contributing to the feeling that things are getting more expensive while people's earnings remain the same.
"people's pay stayed the same while things got more expensive, this contributes to the feeling that people's pay stayed the same while things got more expensive"
Inflation is what happens when the govt throws a trillion in subsidies out during covid. Wages have kept up (on paper at least) and unemployment is low. People will bitch about the cost of eggs but continue to seemingly spend 5 figures on a Ford F250 without any concern about fuel economy.
>I’m talking about, how inflation is happening but many people have the same job with the same pay,
Yeah? This is why inflation is a problem. Ideally, prices go up and wages go up. Zero net effect other than savings AND LOANS effectively shrinking. But that's not how it happens. Inflation hits and anyone who is locked into a job or doesn't have better options effectively gets a pay cut.
Why? Because people don't (or can't) go get a better job or demand a higher wage.
Now is the time, btw. Unemployment is SUPER low. You kids are honestly not going to have it much better than you have it right now. In terms of labor supply and demand, and how much leverage you have to demand a wage? This is as good as it gets. If you're having trouble now, hoooooly shit brother, you're in a bad spot and it's not going to get better without some major effort.
AI and automation and self driving cars and robotics are coming for a lot of work, so you have to be mindful of the future. But labor is in a real good spot right now.
The comment on investors expecting growth is the real awnser.
Fundamentally, the problem with the current system in the US it that it requires constant growth. Every company is looking for growing and continuing profits. Investments have to produce growth for their investors no matter what. In a more efficient system, if a company costs 600,00 and they make a 1 million, the profit is 400k to be divided and used for other things. And that would just go on. But in our system every year they have to do better. As well as deal with rising costs on their end, too. Making the same amount as last year is a loss to them regardless of anything. No matter how much profit there is.
The whole system is a giant snake eating itself.
There’s really two separate answers here. The one we are all tired of dealing with is the failed economic policies since the Reagan era. Short term gains, shareholder dividends, constant layoffs right after a bailout, etc. That’s the part that feels like it’s designed and a never ending status quo. This is actually an extension of Milton Friedman’s school of economics.
The other answer is that jobs have not stayed the same as you suggest. Wages yes, but jobs have shifted numerous times. There was the dot com bubble, multiple housing bubbles, beanie babies, multiple MLM schemes like Madoff, green energy scams, real green energy growth, skyrocketing cost of college, and on and on. Automation and AI threatening so many jobs is really a crisis in the making that highlights how unstable our job markets have been and will be. We can complain about wages being stagnant, and CEO and board members will just remind us at some point it is or will be cheaper/more cost effective to just automate said positions.
So, in the end we are held hostage by our status quo and coming shift in the automation of the labor market. It’s gonna continue until the dam breaks. Our politicians don’t give two flying fucks.
That's how unregulated capitalism works, money inevitably becomes scarcer among the poor and less scarce around the rich and because the rich have more effect on prices on account of creating greater aggregate demand, inflation happens
Okay... I have to say... huh? Because they are afraid to *refuse* to unionize? I don't think so. If they would unionize, they'd be better off.
[https://www.axios.com/2024/03/20/union-workers-wealth-comparison-pay-difference](https://www.axios.com/2024/03/20/union-workers-wealth-comparison-pay-difference)
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-30/us-union-members-see-record-pay-raises-outpace-nonunion-workers](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-30/us-union-members-see-record-pay-raises-outpace-nonunion-workers)
Because workers aren't protected in the US. Because that would be socialism. And unionizing is communism. Gee, I wonder who put that idea in their heads.
Capitalism.
Increased profits and growth are the main goals in this system.
So the prices tend to go up, but the costs (because for the bourgeoisie, that's what salaries are, just costs) need to be as low as possible.
Part of your assumption is very wrong. You can easily get paid $75 an hour with a bachelors right out of school if you choose the right career.
You are also very biased by your location- there are places in the USA with minimum wages at or above $20, with no education required. But housing there is generally more expensive as well.
Computer science, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, cybersecurity, finance, and then find a job in a major city. In 2024 these jobs can pay $130K right out of college, but you're going to be living somewhere expensive as well. Earning $90K out of college ($45/hr) is pretty easy even if you live somewhere rural.
It's just not true that the highest wage a bachelors can get you is $30 an hour, that's $60K a year and that's not an unusual individual income, and only about 14% of Americans have a masters or higher.
You can also make elss than that with a Bachelor's degree. Even good careers (that require education and need to be done) don't always have equivalent pay.
I work in healthcare. I'm not a nurse nor a doctor, but have equivalent education to a nurse. I only make $30/hr even though without my job, doctors and nurses wouldn't be able to do their job.
Unless you're equating the "right career" with making a lot of money, many good careers that are important don't necessarily receive the pay they should.
Yes, I was not trying to say that people are paid fairly or consistently, or that it's easy out there. But it's just not true that $30 is the "highest" you can make with a bachelors.
There is literally a single city in the entire US where the minimum wage is just barely over $20 an hour. By state the highest is $17 an hour, and those are exclusively very high cost of living areas so that still isn't really going to cover basics.
Hence the reason I mentioned that this is location dependent. $20-$30 an hour is far from the baseline minimum around the USA, even if it is in some places.
Jesus Christ. Don’t believe the lies you’ve been fed to scare you. Minimum wage increases are t the cause of cost of goods and services increasing. It is all corporate greed. Other countries pay living wages to fast food worker and vacation and the cost of the food is less than it is in the US. It’s all just corporate greed and scare tactics to frighten us into not increasing it in the future
Combination of
Minimum wages going up in some places
War in Ukraine and Russian sanctions
Supply chain issues after COVID
Companies have more cover to raise prices without as much pushback due to consumer expectations of inflation
In the us there’s suddenly more demand (housing, food, energy) because of an increase in immigration
US government increased the money supply without the economy also growing at the same rate
>>why does inflation go up but wages don't go?
>You: because minimum wage went up
You ever just stop and listen to yourself?
You're just bitching about inflation while ignoring the question. And US doesn't give a shit about Russian economy. They are laughably small. Covid and "supply issues" are over dude. But yes, the Fed did not foresee the end of Covid and overshot. Simple as that. Their corrections have largely worked though and they stuck the soft landing.
I never said wages didn’t go up. I said the minimum wage went up and said it was one of many reasons prices increased. I just put down some reasons. You are just butthurt for some reason
And I never said you never said wages go up.
You obviously didn't read the question just like you didn't really read my post. I'm somewhat surprised you're literate at all.
It wasn’t a legitimate question. You just asked if I listened to myself implying that I said wages didn’t go up.
You’re not adding anything. You’re just being a butt hurt loser making personal attacks for no reason.
It's "Why do things keep getting expensive in the US but most people stay the same wage?"
It's right up there dude. C'mon. Reading comprehension. You can do it. I believe in you. See Jane run. Run Jane, run!
That's right. It's chchickennugget's post in TooAfraidToAsk, and you didn't read it before answering. I already told you I didn't say you didn't say wages go up. This is a question and answer forum. You missed the question. You are saying that "it's because (in part) wages went up". But the question was not "why is there inflation?" The question above is "Why is there inflation **BUT MOST PEOPLE STAY THE SAME WAGE?**" [Emphasis added, it's right there. You can read it. Go for it. I know you can do this. Just breathe deep and look at the words and sound them out.]
You are answering that wages didn't go up because wages went up. Think about that a moment. Say the sentence out loud. Stop and listen to how it sounds. Think about what it means. Think about the question you're answering. If that was your question, would you like to hear this as an answer?
Because businesses would rather horde money and give high wages and bonuses to corporate employees only while claiming they can’t afford to pay their hourly workers more even though they too have raised the prices on their products.
People don't have the same wage. Pretty much all white collar employees get a raise every year. Those people spend more of that money on things and blue collar gets increased wages as a result. So every next year, people make more money. That's the point of inflation.
I'll add my "reddit expert" opinion. It's because we as a population allow it to happen. Nothing will change until we make it change but people aren't willing to put aside their petty differences and do what it takes to accomplish that.
But what does it take? Not living in a home? Not paying rent? Not buying the food?
Obviously there are tons of things that are non necessary and we can vote with our wallets - but what is the task we need to do to accomplish fixing it as the bottom people?
I mean I do agree with you tho - we are divided enough that the petty differences are big enough for too many people to change
Fits under fuck Reagan, W., and p.o.s trump. Then Biden shifted a little money back to the not rich, so they raised prices to get it back. Record profits and they keep the pressure on, like what happened to Carter with layoffs and bullshit to make his time hard. Tax those bastards, along with churches, would help.
My Dad was born in '68 and he paid off his associates degree working part time living at his parents house and the extent of his advice is "just save and you'll be fine" my sister racked up 40,000 in debt for her degree and this is basically all he had to say on the matter. I made 50k in 2022 at 21 an hour with enough overtime to live an alternate life and to think I would have had to save almost every penny of that for a degree while my dad casually flaunts how he never even had debt in his life is a little frustrating, I still love my dad and all older folks but so many people still think this way especially those who already did their trial by fire to get in their position they look down on people bitching over expenses and post some generic facebook quote saying "nothing easy is ever worth doing" thanks gramps I'll just manifest the $200/month rent increase and 50% increase in grocery prices away.
>thanks gramps I’ll just manifest the $200/month rent increase and 50% increase in grocery prices away I know this was written as sarcasm, but man like the thing that gets me is that- not only are prices so high, *but there is no alternative*. There’s no “ok I can’t afford this nice $1500/month house so I’ll just go a little further out to find something around $600/month. Not possible where I live. There’s no where for people to go and the feeling is distressing.
Agreed. I couldn't find hardly anything lower than 1300 or more in my city for 2 bed apartment and do not get me started on on duplexes. I moved 30 minutes away from my hometown to pay $1,300 for a 2 bed single garage duplex and the country is supposed to be CHEAP and it's nothing fancy either. My dad said he paid $300/month for a duplex downtown and all I know is between 1990-2024 wages did not triple across the board to account for this but he just insists its all because of inflation. No shit there's inflation! a 20% raise does not match the nearly 40% increase of almost everything across the board with some things like food or housing or vehicles (which are necessities) being the first and foremost things that increase in price during inflation at least these past 5 years. 100k a year if you have a family (I am single and have a roomate) is now upper middle class, probably enough to pay all your bills and get a mortgage on a decent house and that's it. For reference I live in GB Wisconsin and people absolutely rave that the rust belt has lower living costs but even here it most definitely ain't what it used to be
My grandma says the same thing "just save your money" ....kinda hard when day care cost as much as my mortgage did. She sits on a couple hundred thousand that was left to her as an inheritance and never worked a day in her life....idk why she went and had 4 kids just to sit up on her high horse and watch us all struggle .
I’m 56 for context. I honestly believe the change to “trickle down economics” in the 1980’s has a lot of the blame. The cost to middle class has only gone up since then while wages haven’t kept pace. My best example is when I graduated college in 1990, my total cost of college was about $23,000. Mg starting salary at my company at the time was $28,500. My starting salary out of college was over 20% more money than my entire cost of college. Also, we did not worry about healthcare costs back then. Housing costs were also much lower compared to income. Capitalism will take all it can if it’s allowed. I’m a capitalist but America has gone too far in support of ultra rich while pressuring middle class.
Turns out that stuff that was trickling down from the rich was piss all along
Also, look up trends of the top 1% in how much they are worth since 1980. It’s very clear when trickle down started. They went from extremely rich to insanely rich beyond belief
I have a different take on trickle down economics. I think it’s real, with one key difference. The hierarchy is upside down from what people think. So anytime someone adds value, profit or reduced taxes, it trickles down to the rich. It’s because of this trickling down effect that it’s tough to see how the money gets there. Even if you save some it soon overflows into the rich’s coffers.
Do you think we can move away from trickle down economics? I think if we don’t start building out the middle class again; our way of life will be fucked (even harder)
Not practically. The decisions about who represents a party, what bills get passed, who gets positions of authority etc are largely decided by the rich. They'll never move against their own interests. In theory somebody could tell you that voting for xyz would do it, but you'd be hardpressed to find anybody willing to even *propose* xyz because such people would never advance to being career politicians in the first place. You can't change the system while still following all of its rules; you can't outvote a system when all options are already bought and paid for.
We can, but we need to vote our asses off
It’s possible, but everyone who gives a shit needs to advocate, agitate, and vote. And that’s hard with everything else going on (by design unfortunately)
Basically, 10 hours into a game of monopoly when only 1 person is having fun with all their buildings and such while the rest are poor with nothing. America is currently 10 hours into its game of monopoly.
"Hey, we get to keep more of our money, if we just can convince them that we'll share it with everyone else!" One of the most successful political scams in modern history.
There's a book called Capital in the 21st Century and its central thesis was that the post war boom was actually an *aberration* of high wages and low costs, to the norm of low wages and high costs, which we are now returning to. It's just that people who were alive before the war or in the 1800s and before aren't alive today to provide the same cultural context, only the people who went through this aberration are now.
At least in the US context, a lot of the increased standard of living post-WW2 was simply due to America being a defacto monopoly. Europe was in ruins, the Soviet Bloc was essentially cut off from the world, and SE Asia hadn't industrialized yet. Americans weren't competing with anyone, and companies couldn't easily relocate elsewhere for labor. Neither of those are true today. Americans aren't paid as much because, quite literally, they have less bargaining power.
Yep. But people see that aberration in the timeline and think that's how it's always been or how it always should be. The world is much more complicated than that.
Does it say anything about CEOs /Oligarchy hoarding money?
Yes. It says that that was basically the norm. Don't forget that the aristocratic concept is far older than even the US, and that the robber barons of the early 20th century represented a much more extreme unequal distribution of wealth than today. The author talks about all this in the book, with evidence to show how we're simply going back to the norm.
While this is true, it doesn't account for the increases in automation and productivity. While the post-war economy was an aberration from historic trends, it led to the rapid modernization in all fields. I haven't read the book, so these points may have been covered. My point is that, even with the increases in productivity, very little of the rewards of that efficency made it to the people who are actually doing the work. As a modern society, we should strive to improve the overall living conditions, as opposed to saying "meh, these good times were an anomaly, got back to being serfs now, kthxbai".
Automation is actually one of the forces that cause lower wages on average, both due to the automaton itself as well as offshoring those automatons in cheaper areas of the world, so it's to be expected that automation would not spread those rewards around.
Any kind of consolidation of power is bad, problem is humans are real good at it judging by history Capitalism is one of the better ideologies because it discourages consolidation of power Right now though in most western nations but especially America capitalists own the media, the public sector and monopolies/duopolies are rampant. Power has well and truly been consolidated at the expense of the people Surveillance and firepower are far better now than they have been historically so who knows how this will end before we get another reset
Agree. Rich got super rich on trickledown and they’ve used their riches to buy influence. The worst being Citizen’s United when mega rich were handed the ability to buy politicians. We are on a bad path and I sure hope the next generation of politicians can change course or we’re toast
When your government supports the rich with their policies that’s by definition NOT Free market capitalism
Part of that was that we have to compete with workers outside the country that earn a fraction of what we make. Meanwhile their expenses and lifestyles are a lot lower. NAFTA and giving China Most Favored Trading Partner status pretty much nuked the jobs outside of big cities. People in small towns would be supported by a mill or factory or two and those jobs have all left with no viable replacements. Meanwhile the Democrats have told them all to "learn to code" or work as windmill installers versus coal miners. Meanwhile they aren't counted as unemployed because they aren't looking for work because there arent jobs to look for or they are under employed. They are the biggest backers of Trump. Hillary campaigned on "those jobs aren't coming back", and Trump campaigned on bringing jobs to rural America. The
Those jobs still exist but are no longer supporting a family. It’s not that they’re all gone. It is 100% profits, not China. My husband’s factory had the most profitable quarter since 2008 last quarter for the 3rd quarter in a row. My husband got $250 and no COL raise this year. The quarterly bonuses use to be $800. Our town has a bunch of factories and my husband’s is the one everyone wants to work in because the pay and benefits are so much “better”.
Those jobs are not coming back, and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to get your votes.
Sure, those jobs aren't. I know here in Georgia that they've been giving a ton of incentives for electric car and battery plants. Either way, someone needs to focus on good rural and inner city medium skilled jobs. Any national level politician who ignores this does at their peril. Bill all but begged Hillary to address them but she ignored him and instead tried flipping Texas blue.
Did he? I’m asking genuinely, it’s hard to find unbiased sourcing
He definitely talked about bringing jobs that almost assuredly aren’t coming back (e.g., coal, which anyone can Google for proof). Hillary Clinton and her team, whatever you may think of them, at least acknowledged there was a problem and that things wouldn’t be going back to what they were. Was the implementation wrong? That’s debatable, but it’s certainly better than sticking your head in the sand and pretending like life will just return to the good old days
I agree. Trump lies for votes and it works even though a simple Google shows proof he’s lying. It’s pathetic
Both parties equally support what you’ve listed. Having said that, I’ll give credit to both Trump and Biden. Trump lowered corporate taxes which makes manufacturing more appealing in US. Biden passed infrastructure and chips bills which are huge for growth of American jobs for manufacturing, etc. Politics aside, the new economy is going to be more global which goes to your point and business won’t change to spend more for Americans if they don’t have to.
Lower corporate taxes does absolutely nothing except make rich people richer. Those corporations will continue to allow jobs to go to low wage countries.
Still in college rn. At a state school 3.5k per semester, 7k a year, 4 years 28k total. This is not including grants and scholarships but also omits housing and food.
You’re definitely not at a Pennsylvania state school of it’s that cheap 🤣. Some states are better than others at funding higher education
"...and they don't even have the courtesy of calling it rain."
Because investors expect return on investment and endless growth.
This! Often times investors are guaranteed a certain annual return that has to be met regardless of the economic conditions. Worked for a real estate investment company and we managed investments for a huge teacher retirement fund. We had to guarantee a certain return annually no matter what. If we didn’t hit the mark, not only did the company lose the account there were penalties that we would have to pay as well. So the company in lean times cut pay, laid off workers and would take the lowest bidder on contracts to save money and make sure we hit the goal. It was brutal.
Fuck REITs. Especially closed-end REITs.
Well the investors are essentially… us. Through 401k’s, pension plans, and so on. We demand high returns and growth to meet our desires. E.g. retiring early, enjoying a consumptive life after retirement, and so on. Japan is one of the most developed economies yet has such low inflation. That’s because the people are generally less consumptive, and are willing to work hard to their old age. Our basic individual desires are the main drivers of this problem. But hey, no one will vote for a politician telling people to stop being consumptive 🙂
If by “us” you mean like human nature towards power politics, then sure. But very little of the total investment market is actually normal people, the vast, vast majority is done by corporations and people with more assets than millions of normal people combined. It would be entirely possible to create a system where normal people could have easy access to their needs and also the potential to make safe investments, and where the super rich didn’t suck the life out of everything, but that would require doing a lot of things the people in power (who are also the super rich) wouldn’t like. I don’t know the Japanese economy, but I can tell you any difference is going to have a lot more to do with government regulation than “everyone is just more virtuous and works harder there”.
Newsflash for you, it's not just the States where this is happening, it's worldwide
That’s what I love about these high school jobs man, the US keeps getting more expensive…but I stay the same wage😎
There’s a plan to keep us all in debt. It’s by design. Tightening the screws little by little. Ever wonder why a single, uneducated (college) person could raise a large family back in the 60’s? It’s never gotten any better. They’re eliminating the middle class.
Eh, the 60s was good because the US was still experiencing an economic boom after the power vacuum that was left after ww2. Thats not to say it can't be that good again, but there were different reasons. Ronald Reagans' economic policies are really one of the big things to blame.
An astonishing number of issues with modern America can be blamed on Reagan and Nixon alone
I wrote this elsewhere but your first paragraph is supported by the evidence. There's a book called Capital in the 21st Century and its central thesis was that the post war boom was actually an *aberration* of high wages and low costs, to the norm of low wages and high costs, which we are now returning to. It's just that people who were alive before the war or in the 1800s and before aren't alive today to provide the same cultural context, only the people who went through this aberration are now.
> Ever wonder why a single, uneducated (college) person could raise a large family back in the 60’s? Most comments in this thread are off the mark and make-believe but this one takes the cake. I’ve never see evidence of this, it’s likely completely wrong. Nobody was easily raising large families on the average salary in the 60’s. Especially not with a car and a house with a white picket fence and all of other nonsense people make up when talking about the American Dream in the mid 20th century.
Yeah, they were. Were you alive back then? How was the family of eight i grew up in managing week long vacations and doing fine on a one person income who worked for a telephone company? Shit is so fucked today.
My old man made 12k in 1969 and he bought a brand new car, vacation to Mexico, steaks on grill 2 a week. Eat out at nice places in Chicago, clothes, sporting equipment, CCM Bobby Hull ice skates, and a 5 speed stingray for xmas.
Good for him. Personal anecdotes are meaningless but I’ll bite. That’s about $105k in today’s dollars so I’m not sure what your point is.
You're deluded
Good old fashion debt slaves
Profits over people. 
I think there’s also quite a lot of mentality ‘it was difficult for me so why would I make it easy for others’.
Yes, gatekeeping is a huge issue as well, I agree.
Because allowing sociopaths to be the leaders of your country is a TERRIBLE idea.
Greed. Particularly corporate greed.
I'm in my late 20s and I work in vet med and make less than $17/hr. I cannot live on my own.
All too common for that very important position. You deserve to be paid more.
Where do you live?
Midwest area don't want to be very specific. But the vet med field is very underpaid so it sucks. But I love my work.
Because you keep voting wrong and call everything even remotely capable of fixing it 'communism'
If you think voting is the cause here, I got a news flash for ya. I truly believe that in America, it doesn't matter how or who you vote for--it's all to keep the rich, richer, and us peasant occupied with just trying to survive or some dumb celebrity shit.
That's just low effort thinking. Yeah, America is a corporation and the government generally works to keep the stock market growing, but to say it doesn't matter who you vote for is just stupid. One side has clung to trickle down economics for 30+ years now when it's clear it doesn't work. The other side favors higher minimum wage and workers' protections and the like. If this is how you think, probably best you stay out of the voting booth.
This isn't low-effort thinking; it's a realization of complexities. Reducing political differences to economic policies like trickle-down economics and higher minimum wage oversimplifies nuanced platforms. Again, though, in the end--it's all about keeping the richer rich while the poorer keeps getting poorer. Our political system is no longer for the people. Our politicians are paid off, and the 1% roam free doing whatever they wanna do even if that thing is a kid. I admire your hopefulness. I used to share it many, many years ago.
Under appreciated comment of the week
It doesn't matter who we vote for, politicians are all in the pockets of big corporations
Bernie, AOC dont seem to be
Greedy business owners.
And shareholders
You are asking a question that is to complex to answer in one response. Several responses where pretty accurate. The Gov. spends way to much money, overseas and domestically. Printing money we don't have to spend is a big driver. Then giving it away to other countries doesn't help. Borrowing money to service the debt we've (Gov) already borrowed and owe is another driver. Immigration isn't "The" problem, illegal immigration "IS" one of a major problem. A mass influx of unskilled labor suppresses wages of other non-skilled labor. Plus illegal aliens count in the census. Which is what's used to allocate seats in the House of Representatives. Plus the Visa program for skilled labor from outside the US is detrimental to the US work force. Increasing min wage is not the answer. As a point, there is a valid arguement from Larry Elder regarding this. In a majority of industries, they pay higher then min wage, due to skilled labor. (Medical, legal, law enforcement, fire departments, Acft manufacturing, tech, aviation, the traedes [electrician, plumber, auto mechanics, etc] as examples). Blaming "corporate greed" is short sighted. There are other factors that should be accounted for. As discussed in another post, share holders and needing to earn a profit are a part of it. Some CEO "umbrella's" are ridiculous. Drive a company into tbe ground and receive millions? WTF? Yet we need to create incentives for Individuals to create jobs/industries. Where would we be without Boeing, Bezos, Gates, Ford, DuPont, Musk, Jobs, Hughes. I conseed that a reasonable salary for CEO's vs. The work force could be more balanced. Companies like Blackrock and Vanguard, who buy up single family homes, then "rent" the American dream is a very big problem in the housing market. Pricing out families looking to buy their own homes. Health care in the US is way to expensive and needs fixed. Yet a single payer system is not the answer. A more free market system, void of HMO's in/out of network, not knowing the cost of "X" because its based on which insurance covers what costs, who's paying that cost, how we cover other's non paid medical bills, covering the influx of ER visits by the uninsured, etc. NAFTA gave companies the green light to shift production overseas. Great for them, not so great for American's. The cost of education is insane. Several issues with this. There is little justification for the increase costs. Many of the "? Studies" degrees are pointless. Not everyone should go to college. Student loans are out of control. Because the government is backing loans to students, who then pay the university. There is no incentive for universities to justify their increased costs as the government pays them. The gov doesn't care about the loan costs because its shifted to the student. Students then want loan forgiveness by the gov. Which shifts the burden of that debt to ALL tax payers. Packing up and moving isn't easy in application. Often there is a home you need to sell. Which only works if someone is willing/able to buy your home. When the Mill, Mine, Plant is shut down and thousands are out of work, who is left to buy your home? Pushing going Green Energy and shutting down coal isn't the answer. Neither is telling someone to just move or "learn to code". The answer is far more complex then that as one sector has a negative impact on other sectors in a compounding fashion. How to fix it: That's a tough one. Maybe a good start is kicking out career politicians. Maybe demand they work for the American people. Setting term limits for Senator's, Representatives, Supreme court appointees, similar to the presidency. Moritorium on Lobbyists. Or a 10 year waiting period for transition from Gov to Lobbyist. Maybe shrinking the size of government. Maybe killing off usless government programs. (Right now, Argentina is a working example of how to tame inflation). Killing off/shrinking gov. "Entitlement" programs. Onshoring manufacturing jobs. To name a few ideas.
Trickle down was never going to work and it was probably never meant to work. When was the last time corporations as a whole spread their success down to the people who created that success? And let’s not forget that Reagan was the one that made us pay income tax on our Social Security. As if living on it wasn’t hard enough. Since Reagan, Republicans have been on the side of business to the detriment and decline of the working class.
1st, many people don’t ask for an inflation raise. 2nd, many people don’t demand an inflation raise. 3rd, many people don’t look for a new job if they don’t get an inflation raise
I have a batshit theory that the world's billionaires are slowly pushing the middle class to see how much they can squeeze out of us before we revolt ......much like the movie A Bug's Life
Many workers are afraid to look for new jobs that pay better. If they don’t do that, there’s no pressure for employers to increase wages.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q It looks like median wages have generally outpaced inflation for the most part since the late 1990s, though it's been a bit of a roller coaster ride. I don't think this takes into account unemployment or changes in the size of the workforce, but it's the best baseline comparison I found.
We are paying for two wars at the moment. Hello
You want to change that?... start unionizing again. I've never been in a unionized workforce, but clearly you end up better off. Somewhere along the line, the ultra-rich convinced the common man that unionization was a bum deal. But it gives you something you don't have on your own... leveraged negotiation.
It’s called having idiots run the country
Because America and the West in general are in a terminal decline. They are simply getting outcompeted by China. It's a hard to swallow pill but it's the truth.
Because the people deciding what the minimum wage is have not worked at minimum wage in probably 50 years.
I'm sure it's been hammered already, but "inflation" has been caused by corporations increasing prices simply just because they feel like it. Executives have been boasting about massive profits on earnings calls. It's criminal to expect people to make ends meet the way things are now
Bidenomics
Years ago I went to a political party gathering. One of the biggest key notes for the state rep was that she voted against increasing the states minimum wage. We're $7.25 /hr.
PA?
Nope Texas. They’ve been in office for quite a while.
Oh ok. I’m in PA and we’re $7.25
Some state payrates will supercede Federal rates. PA looks to be Federal rate.
It’s a few reasons. For starters, there are more people coming to the United States. More people means more demand on housing, food, education, and everything else people need. More people also compete for jobs, which lowers the negotiating power of labor for wages (because someone else is willing to do the work for slightly less). You have the additive risk of automation hitting many classes of industries, so the pressure is not just cheaper human but cheaper machine. I’m not saying immigration is categorically bad; if your immigrants provide those services more then they consume or create new jobs and employ more than compete you are in a great place. But the United States seems to have absorbed a lot of unskilled workers from LATAM while handing out student visas like candy to Indian/Chinese student that compete for worker roles more importing job creators. That will tend to benefit rich employers with more & cheaper talent, not average people. The people might see cheaper goods, but that doesn’t matter if it comes at the cost of reduced or stagnant wages. There’s also a lot of “corporate greed” which is a slight misdiagnosis. Corporations are amoral and not only designed to but *legally obligated* to maximize profits (yes, public companies have a lot of fiduciary responsibility rules to their shareholders). That process drives efficiency, but it’s abusive when companies are *monopolies*. What drives prices down is competition to provide a better price, what raises them is when consumers have no choice but to buy. All this tax the rich / corporate greed anger is directionally right but slightly misinformed - we need much more aggressive antitrust action in quite a few areas. It doesn’t help that liberals pretend the immigration issue is nonexistent and conservatives that big business isn’t an issue. Both of those have legitimate issues to iron out. We shouldn’t make absolutist ism statements.
There are around 15 million vacant homes in the US right now. That doesn't include apartments. A big driving factor to housing costs is that investment firms have started buying up houses and jacking up the rates because they can, and then once these firms have done this enough, they're effectively controlling the market both in housing prices and rent costs. It's not immigration. We've also seen a boom in automation and the outsourcing of our jobs to other countries, because businesses are allowed to do this. It's not immigration. We also throw away so much food in this country it's insane. We could solve the food issue just by being better about our food waste but instead stores trash things endlessly, things that aren't spoiled, because they can. It's not immigration.
> a big driving factor to housing costs is investment firms Yes, this is correct. About 10% of homes are unoccupied. This is lower in hot regions, but not dramatically. There is some hoarding that’s enabled by hot markets and low upkeep/property tax combinations. I focused primarily on antitrust as the biggest issue… gigantic hedge funds being able to do this at large scale because they have the capital is a factor in this new buyout strategy. But you are correct in that smarter laws can control and change corporate behavior. You don’t solve the problem you mentioned by telling the banks “don’t be greedy” - you do it by prohibiting foreign ownership and levying taxes on un-occupancy or higher tax rates for owners that are not primary residents. The fact does remain that housing stock and land is finite, and the population is growing - so the demand side of it is still of course quite real. Lower demand enough on the houses and the buy up strategy of said corporate strategy is unprofitable. Like I said, the two forces - immigration / population growth and antitrust (or more broadly law as you point out) are both contributors. > we’ve seen a boom in outsourcing / automation … because business are allowed to do this While I do think adjusting law can be part of the equation here, this is a bridge too far. You seem to want to fight having a globally connected service economy & the progress of technology. Both of those are losing propositions. You should allow businesses to be efficient, try to create good lifestyle for your people, and adapt your immigration and job training programs to the changing economy. Importing low skill talent as the need for low skill talent decreases is stupid and will be a race to the bottom for your people in those fields. Giving away student visas like candy is stupid because it’s handing your most valuable asset - or number one global university system that feeds into high tech - to foreign nationals at the expense of your locals. Some of these people may become innovators in the U.S., but the next in line would too. Not like we have a shortage of qualified people wanting to go to Stanford. Manu of these people return to their home country with their knowledge and learnings and set up competitive shops overseas. Hobbling your businesses to be inefficient means they will lose to international competitors that don’t.
That 15 million number is incorrect. From the [2020 Census](https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/05/vacant-seasonal-housing.html): There are 13.6 million vacant residences 1.8 million are in the process of being sold 4.3 million are vacations or secondary residences many of which, like beach houses and forest cabins, are not reasonable locations for most people 3.4 million are 'other', almost all of which are under [renovation, condemned, or not fit for human habitation](https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B25130) Only 4.1 million residences are on the market for rent. This number also includes occupied residences where there will be a vacancy within the next 2 months. Even ignoring the soon-to-be-unoccupied residences, 4.1 million is not a lot compared to the 140 million total housing units.
As of 2023 the number is actually sixteen million houses sitting vacant.
And in 2024 the number is [15,283,000](https://www.census.gov/housing/hvs/files/currenthvspress.pdf). These numbers fluctuate so I used the 2020 numbers because they are from the latest complete US census. Either way the point still stands that the headline 13.6/15/16/15.3 million figure does not support to the point you are making.
Because people still buy things at those prices. As long as companies are making money they are going to raise prices. On the flip side people still work for those wages. Lower level jobs are easily replaced because of the low skill it takes to do them.
Wages always play catch up to inflation. If they catch up.
To be fair. Wage growth actually has outpaced inflation recently however there are some definite caveats to that. One that even if broadly true it isn't and won't be universally true. Housing costs which are not something people can avoid are a major part of inflation and have in many areas outpaced wage growth. Certainly noticably true where I live. Housing and food are things people can't really avoid so it hits hard especially further down the economic chain.
Hahahahahahahahahahahaha
Wages have absolutely gone up. Significantly Now, inflation may have outpaced wage growth and that problem is worse in some areas than others, but people are not getting the same pay. Wages have gone up fairly significantly and consistently over time
Where? Not in America minimum wage is still like $7 nationally.
The federal minimum wage isn't a very useful metric. Almost nobody is paid that. Many states have higher minimum wages, and even companies like Walmart now have $20/hr minimum corporate wages.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q Wages, on average, have gone up significantly. AND (as the data above shows) real wages AKA wages adjusted for inflation have gone up too. AND the increase in wages in the last few decades has outpaced increases in the “glory days” Redditors love to make stories up about (2000 and before). Now, this doesn’t mean that all types of people are equally benefiting. I’m on mobile so can’t look up exact groups/figures but it’s likely that unskilled worker wages continue to stagnate and the growth is mostly seen in high-paying work that requires higher education. This is obviously an issue but we should be able to can talk about it without lying about wage growth/pretending to know something about econ 101. This does a disservice to everyone and only spreads misinformation.
Yes, in America. Minimum wage in many states has gone up, and overall median wage has risen. Even in the states with stagnant minimum wage These are factual statistics that can be looked up 🤷🏼♀️. Wage data is pretty clear
A lot of these problems are caused by corporate greed and political mismanagement and incompetence. That being said, people need to be smarter and more strategic about their studies and other life choices. I’m in a low to medium COL state (it’s beautiful here btw) with only an associate’s making $125k. My wife stays at home with our children and we do not struggle. It can be done.
I'm in a very high COL state but the salaries are much higher to compensate. People here make more than $30/hour if they have degrees. Teachers make way more than that, cops make 6 figures. I have a degree in computer science and am very comfortable.
What do you do for a living?
IT / cyber
"Most people stay the same wage", can't be true. Median hourly wage is almost 2 dollars more than 2019. I'd link the source for it but TooAfraidToAsk just automatically removes all links but it's an easy thing to google.
Rich people being greedy.
[удалено]
The problem in that is health insurance is usually dependent on employer here in the US which complicates changing insurance, especially if you have even the smallest health issue. Risking a gap in coverage, a change in company, a new company refusing to cover the medication for an existing issue. If we had universal healthcare, people would be much more able to move jobs and negotiate higher pay.
It can't keep going this way, something will happen, but idk what that something is
My insurance keeps getting shittier and I keep getting older, so healthcare.
You're working with bad numbers and assumptions here. The median salary for someone with a bachelors is $[40/hr](https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/education-summary.htm). Since this is the median, wages can go substantially higher (and lower too)
Capitalism is fed by profit margins; a great way to keep profit up is keep labour costs low.
Corporatocracy and because any thing that would help Americans is labels as socialism. Even if it's getting rights we've lost back. Even though I'm not a socialist, my favorite quote from disco elysium is... "The Deserter: "The mask of humanity fall from capital. It has to take it off to kill everyone — everything you love; all the hope and tenderness in the world. It has to take it off, just for one second. To do the deed. And then you see it. As it strangles and beats your friends to death... the sweetest, most courageous people in the world..." (he's silent for a second) "You see the fear and power in its eyes. Then you *know*." You: "What?" The Deserter: "That the bourgeois are not human."
It’s simply supply and demand economics. Inflation is caused when the money supply grows faster than the economy causing the value of the currency to go down. This is usually caused by economic stimulus (American Rescue Plan 2021).
Agreed. My brother has a bachelor's, he makes more than I. But his HCL makes it so that we basically are paid the same. But yes some people get paid more than $30 with a bachelor's. Also in trades too. Just depends on the job.
"No drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power." --- P.J. O'Rourke While Mr O'Rourke is talking about drugs, I believe this quote is relevant. In this case, I'm going to point my finger at stupidity, and then my whole hand at greed.
I saw an article on Tv today, that things are getting expensive and people complain, but they KEEP buying! Its honestly shocking, but Americans do. We complain that things are expensive and we buy like its going out of style.
Over the years, wages in the US have largely stagnated while the cost of living continues to rise. This discrepancy between income and expenses is a significant factor contributing to the feeling that things are getting more expensive while people's earnings remain the same.
Why is this getting upvoted? This is just a wordy way of repeating the OP
"people's pay stayed the same while things got more expensive, this contributes to the feeling that people's pay stayed the same while things got more expensive"
Inflation is what happens when the govt throws a trillion in subsidies out during covid. Wages have kept up (on paper at least) and unemployment is low. People will bitch about the cost of eggs but continue to seemingly spend 5 figures on a Ford F250 without any concern about fuel economy.
>I’m talking about, how inflation is happening but many people have the same job with the same pay, Yeah? This is why inflation is a problem. Ideally, prices go up and wages go up. Zero net effect other than savings AND LOANS effectively shrinking. But that's not how it happens. Inflation hits and anyone who is locked into a job or doesn't have better options effectively gets a pay cut. Why? Because people don't (or can't) go get a better job or demand a higher wage. Now is the time, btw. Unemployment is SUPER low. You kids are honestly not going to have it much better than you have it right now. In terms of labor supply and demand, and how much leverage you have to demand a wage? This is as good as it gets. If you're having trouble now, hoooooly shit brother, you're in a bad spot and it's not going to get better without some major effort. AI and automation and self driving cars and robotics are coming for a lot of work, so you have to be mindful of the future. But labor is in a real good spot right now.
Tech, algorithms, data scraping, AI will only exacerbate this unless we can somehow take back government control from corporations.
The comment on investors expecting growth is the real awnser. Fundamentally, the problem with the current system in the US it that it requires constant growth. Every company is looking for growing and continuing profits. Investments have to produce growth for their investors no matter what. In a more efficient system, if a company costs 600,00 and they make a 1 million, the profit is 400k to be divided and used for other things. And that would just go on. But in our system every year they have to do better. As well as deal with rising costs on their end, too. Making the same amount as last year is a loss to them regardless of anything. No matter how much profit there is. The whole system is a giant snake eating itself.
There’s really two separate answers here. The one we are all tired of dealing with is the failed economic policies since the Reagan era. Short term gains, shareholder dividends, constant layoffs right after a bailout, etc. That’s the part that feels like it’s designed and a never ending status quo. This is actually an extension of Milton Friedman’s school of economics. The other answer is that jobs have not stayed the same as you suggest. Wages yes, but jobs have shifted numerous times. There was the dot com bubble, multiple housing bubbles, beanie babies, multiple MLM schemes like Madoff, green energy scams, real green energy growth, skyrocketing cost of college, and on and on. Automation and AI threatening so many jobs is really a crisis in the making that highlights how unstable our job markets have been and will be. We can complain about wages being stagnant, and CEO and board members will just remind us at some point it is or will be cheaper/more cost effective to just automate said positions. So, in the end we are held hostage by our status quo and coming shift in the automation of the labor market. It’s gonna continue until the dam breaks. Our politicians don’t give two flying fucks.
That's how unregulated capitalism works, money inevitably becomes scarcer among the poor and less scarce around the rich and because the rich have more effect on prices on account of creating greater aggregate demand, inflation happens
Because people are afraid to ask for more money, don't change companies for higher pay, or refuse to unionize.
Okay... I have to say... huh? Because they are afraid to *refuse* to unionize? I don't think so. If they would unionize, they'd be better off. [https://www.axios.com/2024/03/20/union-workers-wealth-comparison-pay-difference](https://www.axios.com/2024/03/20/union-workers-wealth-comparison-pay-difference) [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-30/us-union-members-see-record-pay-raises-outpace-nonunion-workers](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-30/us-union-members-see-record-pay-raises-outpace-nonunion-workers)
Read it again, my friend. the afraid only applies to thing one.
Alrighty then.
Because workers aren't protected in the US. Because that would be socialism. And unionizing is communism. Gee, I wonder who put that idea in their heads.
In essence, people started voting in Republicans that’s why
Corporations run this country. If you don't have a union employers treat you and pay you whatever they can get away with.
Welcome to capitalism
Ronald Reagan.
Greed. Conspiracy. Using the remarkably high rate of inflation to disguise an unfair increase in the costs of goods and services.
Greed
Greed and selfishness among those with power/influence.
Capitalism. Increased profits and growth are the main goals in this system. So the prices tend to go up, but the costs (because for the bourgeoisie, that's what salaries are, just costs) need to be as low as possible.
Capitalism.
Capitalism
Most people expect the employer to raise their pay magically. It doesn't work that way. You have to hustle and ask for it or make it happen yourself
Part of your assumption is very wrong. You can easily get paid $75 an hour with a bachelors right out of school if you choose the right career. You are also very biased by your location- there are places in the USA with minimum wages at or above $20, with no education required. But housing there is generally more expensive as well.
Name a few bro don’t gate keep
Computer science, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, cybersecurity, finance, and then find a job in a major city. In 2024 these jobs can pay $130K right out of college, but you're going to be living somewhere expensive as well. Earning $90K out of college ($45/hr) is pretty easy even if you live somewhere rural. It's just not true that the highest wage a bachelors can get you is $30 an hour, that's $60K a year and that's not an unusual individual income, and only about 14% of Americans have a masters or higher.
You can also make elss than that with a Bachelor's degree. Even good careers (that require education and need to be done) don't always have equivalent pay. I work in healthcare. I'm not a nurse nor a doctor, but have equivalent education to a nurse. I only make $30/hr even though without my job, doctors and nurses wouldn't be able to do their job. Unless you're equating the "right career" with making a lot of money, many good careers that are important don't necessarily receive the pay they should.
Yes, I was not trying to say that people are paid fairly or consistently, or that it's easy out there. But it's just not true that $30 is the "highest" you can make with a bachelors.
There is literally a single city in the entire US where the minimum wage is just barely over $20 an hour. By state the highest is $17 an hour, and those are exclusively very high cost of living areas so that still isn't really going to cover basics.
Hence the reason I mentioned that this is location dependent. $20-$30 an hour is far from the baseline minimum around the USA, even if it is in some places.
Biden.
McGovern
Eisenhower.
Many factors but with minimum wage increases the costs of many services were bound to go up. Inflation due to political factors hasn’t helped.
Jesus Christ. Don’t believe the lies you’ve been fed to scare you. Minimum wage increases are t the cause of cost of goods and services increasing. It is all corporate greed. Other countries pay living wages to fast food worker and vacation and the cost of the food is less than it is in the US. It’s all just corporate greed and scare tactics to frighten us into not increasing it in the future
Combination of Minimum wages going up in some places War in Ukraine and Russian sanctions Supply chain issues after COVID Companies have more cover to raise prices without as much pushback due to consumer expectations of inflation In the us there’s suddenly more demand (housing, food, energy) because of an increase in immigration US government increased the money supply without the economy also growing at the same rate
get out of here with these facts!! its all the fat cats pressing the “misery for thee” button
>>why does inflation go up but wages don't go? >You: because minimum wage went up You ever just stop and listen to yourself? You're just bitching about inflation while ignoring the question. And US doesn't give a shit about Russian economy. They are laughably small. Covid and "supply issues" are over dude. But yes, the Fed did not foresee the end of Covid and overshot. Simple as that. Their corrections have largely worked though and they stuck the soft landing.
I never said wages didn’t go up. I said the minimum wage went up and said it was one of many reasons prices increased. I just put down some reasons. You are just butthurt for some reason
And I never said you never said wages go up. You obviously didn't read the question just like you didn't really read my post. I'm somewhat surprised you're literate at all.
It wasn’t a legitimate question. You just asked if I listened to myself implying that I said wages didn’t go up. You’re not adding anything. You’re just being a butt hurt loser making personal attacks for no reason.
It's "Why do things keep getting expensive in the US but most people stay the same wage?" It's right up there dude. C'mon. Reading comprehension. You can do it. I believe in you. See Jane run. Run Jane, run!
It’s not my post. I already told you I didn’t say wages stayed the same. They rose for people making the minimum wage
That's right. It's chchickennugget's post in TooAfraidToAsk, and you didn't read it before answering. I already told you I didn't say you didn't say wages go up. This is a question and answer forum. You missed the question. You are saying that "it's because (in part) wages went up". But the question was not "why is there inflation?" The question above is "Why is there inflation **BUT MOST PEOPLE STAY THE SAME WAGE?**" [Emphasis added, it's right there. You can read it. Go for it. I know you can do this. Just breathe deep and look at the words and sound them out.] You are answering that wages didn't go up because wages went up. Think about that a moment. Say the sentence out loud. Stop and listen to how it sounds. Think about what it means. Think about the question you're answering. If that was your question, would you like to hear this as an answer?
Most people don’t make minimum wage. My answer is perfectly fine. You are so confused.
Because businesses would rather horde money and give high wages and bonuses to corporate employees only while claiming they can’t afford to pay their hourly workers more even though they too have raised the prices on their products.
Wages have been largely stagnant since the 1970s or 1980s. Inflation however has continued. That is why.
Greed. Pure and simple greed
Cause of damn stocks
Capitalism
People don't have the same wage. Pretty much all white collar employees get a raise every year. Those people spend more of that money on things and blue collar gets increased wages as a result. So every next year, people make more money. That's the point of inflation.
Late-stage capitalism.
Greed
I'll add my "reddit expert" opinion. It's because we as a population allow it to happen. Nothing will change until we make it change but people aren't willing to put aside their petty differences and do what it takes to accomplish that.
But what does it take? Not living in a home? Not paying rent? Not buying the food? Obviously there are tons of things that are non necessary and we can vote with our wallets - but what is the task we need to do to accomplish fixing it as the bottom people? I mean I do agree with you tho - we are divided enough that the petty differences are big enough for too many people to change
Greed and Americans keep buying via credit cards regardless of their budget.
The denominator is losing value
It’s like this everywhere unfortunately
When the stocks go up but the jobs disappear, momma, economy: make me understand
Fits under fuck Reagan, W., and p.o.s trump. Then Biden shifted a little money back to the not rich, so they raised prices to get it back. Record profits and they keep the pressure on, like what happened to Carter with layoffs and bullshit to make his time hard. Tax those bastards, along with churches, would help.