Why Americans feel gloomy about the economy despite falling inflation and low unemployment

Lee Duna@lemmy.nz to News@lemmy.world – 353 points –
Why Americans feel gloomy about the economy despite falling inflation and low unemployment
apnews.com
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Because the 'numbers' that neoliberals have decided are the indicators of a "good" economy mean almost nothing to, in all likely hood, 95% of Americans.

Measuring the right thing leads to inconvenient conclusions (age till retirement, income at retirement, income independence, buying power, home ownership, business ownership, union membership, etc.)

Bloody well hate the neoliberals. One was arguing with me on reddit that because people in Kenya are better off, compared to the 80s, I should stop complaining.

Like ok I am happy for the people of Kenya. I got nothing against them. So yeah good job. Now can my healthcare costs please go down? Because I am pretty confident that they can and the people of Kenya can also be doing well. One really doesn't impact the other that much.

No, you see, because TVs have gotten consistently cheaper (they're like the only thing to have done so), everything's working!

And the main reason they're cheaper is because all of them are data harvesting machines. What a fun world where even your habits are a commodity!

Like they even give a shit about Kenya. Just blatant manipulation.

I love that they chose a term to further muddy the waters between conservatives and liberals.

I hear neoliberal and I think, “huh, is the a new liberal?” Nope. It’s the exact fucking opposite.

That term isn't new nor is it meant to muddy any waters. Liberals are not leftists.

That’s exactly what leftists are. The left is liberal. The right is conservative.

Outside the US, "liberal" often means "libertarian", not leftist. The Liberals in the UK and in Australia are very pro-business. The leftist parties in both countries, and elsewhere, call themselves "Labor" not "Liberal".

In the US, "neo-liberals" often refers to people who wanted to install pro-business regimes in other countries, like Iraq...

Whenever you see reference to neoliberalism or someone mentions 'leftists' relative to 'liberals' it is in context with classical liberalism.

The wiki page is a pretty good jumping off point to understand some of the distinctions and discourse.

www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_liberalism

No, the left is socialist, the center is liberal, the right is conservative

Fuck neoliberalism. Glad I found out what it was. It really highlights everything that is wrong with the American economy.