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Oh boy...
To try and defend the vibecession a bit: we can bemoan the prevalence of vibes over data for the next three Presidential terms, but I think we have to accept that vibes simply rule the day, and perhaps they always have. Pinker jinxed the world, entropy only ever increases over time, etc. Right now, it does feel like things are getting worse and the world as we know it is perched on a cliff looking over one long fall, and every other day, we can hear the little tink-tink of tiny pieces of rock breaking off of the cliff face underneath us and falling into the abyss.
If anything, I think waving the data as a weapon might only entrench the vibes. Everything looks good, which can only mean that things are about to get bad if they aren't already. An example, for the sake of narrative: everything was probably all peachy-keen and boring on the morning of September 11th, 2001. President Bush was reading to schoolkids. People were at work like any other day. If you'd tried to tell people on that morning, or the day before, that 9/11/2001 would be the harbinger of decades of death and ruin for many, they'd have probably walked away, muttering under their breath about how you should be in the loony house.
Even now, there are two newsworthy wars happening right now, and multiple other, lesser-known conflicts (as documented in the excellent Transnational Thursdays threads), with any single one carrying the tiny potential to spill over into something greater. So far, we've dodged the bullet of WW3 starting, but being lucky is not a vindication of rationalism.
Sure, maybe it's all purely psychology, and you can't reason the sheeple out of a perception they never reasoned themselves into, but again, entropy (i.e. chaos) always increases over time, and betting that things will get worse is probably a safer investment than actual financial instruments right now.
The vibe-cession is real and the statistics are lying.
The true working class is those in their 20s and 30s, and they don't have houses. They are the ones complaining. Those in their 20-30s are the vibes. This has always been true. When people complain about the plight of an era, they are talking about those who are trying to setup the foundations for life as an adult. Not those who have been at it for decades.
First, Post-covid inflation and job growth were localized phenomenon. Housing prices are down in downtown-cores and rural areas. But, there are no jobs in rural areas and downtown cores are zombie-towns no one wants to live in. Elsewhere, Housing shot up in 50-100% over covid and it never came down. So even if average salaries have gone up and average inflation has stayed within range....... the localized inflation & job growth taken together might not paint as rosy of a picture. (as an aside, If I had sudden windfall, I would spend some time doing pro-bono work on improving economic metrics. How is economics stuck with such crude metrics in 2023)
Second, a bonus is a bonus and a promotion is a promotion. That's not supposed to be natural wage growth. (or so people think). In the run-up to Covid, a lot of people were getting huge bonuses and promos. This led to people thinking they have worked themselves out of the middle class. So, they spent like it, they lived like it and the ensuing whiplash was huge. The people who got swift career growth in the late 2010s, are now realizing that all those gains have been for naught. At the same time, they are stuck with higher responsibilities and the insane hours that come with the promise of a promotion or a bonus. Now yes, their wages have kept up with inflation, so things look all good. But, to them, it feels like they had been cheated out of a better life.
Even the big-mac index becomes a bad measure when 70s McDonalds is unrecognizable from the disgusting place that it has become today. Portion sizes are smaller, fast food tastes a lot worse and everyone working there sounds so much more miserable. Inflation measured in isolation tells you nothing about the ground reality. It's like statistics that go : "The average American is a millionaire".
The average American is a millionaire, but 57% have less than $1,000 in a Savings account.
Lies, damn lies, and statistics.
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To further lend support for a vibes based argument...
Times of plenty are over. For people, for businesses, for nations, on all levels, people are switching to a scarcity mindset. No amount of data is going to change this. Inflation is squeezing people, even if their income has kept up, of which I'm highly skeptical. Businesses are experiencing a massive credit crunch with rates going up as high, as quickly, as they have. And nations are sweating constant supply chain ripples that still haven't stopped in the aftermath of COVID. Factory shut downs gave way to trade wars and hot wars. It feels like everything is coming apart at the seams on all levels, which is going to motivate agents at all levels of society to make decisions that cause the seams to come apart faster. I'm fearful every day the other shoe will finally drop with Taiwan.
Chaos and destabilization rule the day. People aren't just looking at their quality of life now, which has likely gotten measurably worse, but can feel the vibe that nobody is making any actual headway in making tomorrow better.
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