Paul Krugman posted this chart today from the Fed's annual survey of economic well-being:
There are two interesting things here. First, if you look at the top line it's nearly flat. This is people reporting on their own finances, and COVID-19 had almost no effect at all. None. There's even a slight uptick in 2021, probably thanks to federal assistance. Overall, though, the pandemic simply had no impact on people's assessment of their own finances.
Second, the pandemic had a huge impact on views of the economy in general. Thanks to news coverage, most of the country concluded that the economy was in free fall even though they themselves were doing OK.
I'm still not sure what to make of this general phenomenon. We see it all the the time, from crime to schools to politics. People report that things are OK personally (my schools are good, my congressman is fine, etc.) but that the country generally is going to hell. Does this have some kind of rational basis? Is it mostly due to doomsaying news coverage? Or what? It really deserves some rigorous research.
COVID
Look at what you posted a few hours ago, arguing that we're about to head into a recession.
😉
Though in 2022, inflation was the problem
People tend to respond to surveys about "the economy" based on their future expectations, not current data. For two and a half years, they have been bombarded with news reports along the lines of "OK here are some figures that look good, but most economists predict a recession real soon now", along with "inflation still running hot" when in fact it's declined significantly, and other scary stories about unaffordable housing etc. And that's the traditional media; Republicans and right-wing propaganda networks have engaged in non-stop dishonest hysteria about "Biden's terrible economy" almost since he was inaugurated.
So it's little wonder so many Americans are convinced that things are crook in Tallarook, even if they themselves are fine.
Classic, "I'm better off than you because I'm a better person than you", all the way down.
Because journalists don't report the news. They report what people say the news is. That changed a bit during the Trump years but appears to be backsliding.
OT: If you really believe there is no way a preemptive lawsuit could work (which I think is incorrect, but whatever), then why not have Biden issue an Executive Order directing the Treasury to immediately issue new bonds that would take us over the debt ceiling?
Only if it was argued that that debt was needed so the Treasury could stop taking extraordinary measures.
The argument for the 14th amendment only really applies if there is a crisis. The president is not authorized to issue debt just for the sake of issuing debt. However, issuing debt to cover authorized spending is why we have the 14th amendment, and in that case, the debt ceiling violates the constitution.
I'm confused by what you're saying.
If issuing new bonds ahead of schedule to pay for debt that will be incurred by the 2023 FY budget is not possible, how can it be that Treasury can issue bonds ahead of schedule to its anticipatory needs, ever?
That is, after all, how Treasury works, with the mindset of minimizing the costs of its bonds by trying to stay only slightly ahead of its actual debts.
And technically, the debt ceiling is about Treasury not being allowed to issue new bonds that exceed X total value, aka the debt ceiling. So, just a simple directive to issue new bonds that exceed that authorized amount should set the wheels in motion.
The difference is that issuing debt up to the debt ceiling is fine--that's authorized by Congress.
Issuing debt beforehand to bust the debt ceiling is not allowed, and the 14th amendment does not apply. Only if there is a crises can you invoke the 14th amendment to avoid problems. Granted, it won't be clean cut.
"...why not have Biden issue an Executive Order directing the Treasury to immediately issue new bonds that would take us over the debt ceiling?"
Another possibility. Have Biden issue an EO declaring bonds held by the government itself not officially "debt" in what counts as debt under the debt ceiling.
That would free up about $5T before the debt limit is reached, enough to get through Biden's current term and beyond.
Crazy? Maybe, but not nearly as crazy as what the GOP is doing right now.
Legal? Probably, according to Ira Goldman, who has other ideas as well.
Biden and the Dems have options. There is no need to capitulate.
While intriguing, this would redefine some "debt", which goes against certain international norms, including the UN's System of National Accounts, I think?
For better or worse, there would be global consequences to this action, even if one-off, that would tend to distort national economic data. Maybe this is a good thing -- if you were going to go down the road of MMT, you might start here.
an obvious first step to analyzing the underlying cause is to to a time series analysis of the gap between your own vs national economic state as far back as fed data goes. off the top of my head i'd guess it is largely due to negative news coverage and extreme partisanship. and if you could get partisan breakouts and look at how they vary depending on the party of the president that could also shed some light. i'm pretty sure republicans consistently rate the economy as worse under dem president completely independent of any actual economic data.
Nattering nabobs of negativism....
Yes Mr. Vice President 🙂
Regardless of their political leanings, listening to average Joes and Janes opining on about the the economy, crime, foreign policy, or any other topic of national importance has lead me to believe that they don't know if their a$$es are drilled or punched.
LOL. So true. Outside of their narrow areas of expertise many people are incredibly ill-informed. This is not a surprise. The world is a huge, complicated place. Most of us just know about our little bubbles. Still, it is interesting to see the results of this kind of survey.
Especially in recent years, it has become harder to know what is going on outside your own circle of friends. Newspapers are shutting down and online news tends to highlight the more exciting or salacious items.
Moreover, news tends to report isolated data points. So we hear about the monthly inflation rate or unemployment rate. It would be better to always chart that data related to that of the last several years or even decades to give it context.
The bigger danger is how many people are blithely unaware of how ill-informed they are.
You see this all the time in comedy shows such as when Jay Leno would go out and interview people on the street and ask simple questions. The answers were all over the map. I think my favorite was the woman who thought there were 75 feet in a mile. Leno pointed to someone a little ways off and said “So that guy is about five miles away?”
Why is the criteria for the respondent’s own status (at least okay) broader than the more specific criteria (good or excellent) for local and national?
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Lake Tahoe
Works
Even if we had a perfect understanding of how everyone else was faring, this shouldnt be that suprising given how we view collective well being.
If 10-20% of people are in terrible shape or undergoing a crisis in some regard (health, schopls, finances, etc...), we should expect to see most people reporting that they are fine but that the collective is struggling.
Looking up the status ladder makes you feel bad - "I'm sad because my peers have bigger yachts than mine". Looking down the status ladder makes you feel good. Thinking that my schools, my finances, my neighborhood are better than the rest of the country is an ego boost. Of course, this works whether the perception is accurate or not. So we filter for information that shows others are not doing so well as we are.
The only way to ignore the elephant in the room is to be diligent in ignoring the elephant in the room. Likewise, the only way ignore the cause of the "I'm OK, you're not" phenomenon is to diligently ignore its cause no matter how obvious it has become.
For those whose diligence is fortunately flagging, the elephant in the room is the fact that we are subjects of a social system. If we are wise, then the social system is benefiting from our actions at our expense and we are benefiting in the long term. If we choose to ignore the elephant, then we are serving some part of the system at its expense, the system is incurring a detriment in the short term, and we all incur a detriment in the long term.
The above is a theory that does not deserve what I expect it will get, which is a reflexive dismissal. Instead, it is a theory that deserves some rigorous research. Sooner would be better.
The Lake Wobegon effect: "Where every child is above average."
Reports of American Christians beliefs find most believe they will go to heaven while believing most of their peers will not.
You're conflating two concepts that you should not be conflating.
I am a medical doctor if I have an MD and act like I am an MD. I am not a medical doctor if I got an MD and became a snake oil salesman. Likewise, I am a Christian if I call myself a Christian and act like a Christian. Otherwise, I am a CHRINO (Christian in name only).
For the record, a real Christian is a "do unto others as you would have others do unto you" person and not a "do as I say and not as I do" person.
Bob Dylan rule: don't criticize what you can't understand.
For the record, there are very few "real" Christians in this country.
According to Matthew 7:13-14, there was was not a lot of wisdom in evidence in Biblical times either.
While I'm on my soapbox, the opposite of wisdom is ignorance, which is a skill that some very intelligent people have developed into a science. The only reason they get away with it is because we fail to draw a distinction between wisdom and intelligence.
Place wisdom on the vertical axis with intelligence on the horizontal axis and what you will find is that, if there is any correlation, it is slightly negative. Intelligence is a tool that can be used for good or to get away with being ignorant.
Too many "Christians" are not true Scotsmen.