re: The economy is soooooo terrible

OP is welcome to fill my truck up on his dime

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Ohhh, sick burn u noticed the graphics got the date wrong

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No sir!
I noticed "u" got the graphics right.

Potatobrain absolutely raped Americans economically in year one, and continued running prices through the roof until your graphic start date. That is the absurdity of your starting point.

But you did not construct that graphic. The person who did, absolutely played you.

dive into the data then ,,

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Miriam was his biggest donor

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False as the norm with you.

Miriam wasn’t even a big donor to his 2022 campaign.

Trying to justify her $100 million to Trump.

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A good way to not piss off the voters we need is to constantly tell them this administration is terrible. That seems to be the winning strategy of many conservatives.

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Let me ask you a question…

If things are going splendidly do you think that the masses are going to fall for such obviously fake bull crap?

The answer to that is a resounding “no”. Their everyday lives and those of their friends and family are going to tell them otherwise.

The truth is that a lot of people are not doing all that great and that the higher energy costs we’ve seen this year are just ramping up right before people start looking at their options on the ballot. Will they give Trump the benefit of the doubt and vote R or will they tune him and the Dems out, or will they flip to vote for the leftists? None of us know. But there is no doubt that he, his policies and people’s wallets are going to be under close examination and consideration.

And stop attacking Conservatives. It won’t help in November and fractures his base. Understand their frustration with the absolute out of control spending that Trump takes little leadership in attempting to curb. People like me want Trump to step up and lead. Use the veto pen when it’s warranted and explain to the American people what is going on in DC and how it is impacting things currently and for future generations. Really lay it out. Sound bites owning the libs isn’t cutting it. The middle class is being squeezed and he cannot afford to lose them.

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Housing is currently more affordable than at any point in the 3 1/2 decades between 1972 and 2007.

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Americans' collective credit card debt stands at $1.26 trillion, remaining near the all-time high of $1.28 trillion set in late 2025

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This is an excellent example of using statistics to sell this "affordability crisis" that doesn't really exist.

Of course we're near an all time high for credit card debt in raw numbers. There are more people in America than there used to be and they make more money than ever.

Let's look at the picture in more meaningful terms. Credit card debt as a percentage of disposable income.

1996— 8.1%
2006— 9.0%
2016— 6.8%
2026— 5.7%

Doesn't fit the narrative, does it? We have the lowest credit card to disposable income ratio in 10, 20, and 30 years.

How about default rates? That's another useful metric:

1996— 4.5%
2006— 4.2%
2016— 2.3%
2026— 2.85%

Another surprise for those of you who have bought into the "affordability crisis" narrative.

It was roughly a half a percent better in 2016, other than that, same story.

Let's look at groceries:

Adjusted for inflation, the same average of groceries were:

1986— 3.0% more expensive than today
1996— 2.5% more expensive than today
2006— 1.3% less expensive than today
2016— 2.9% more expensive than today

Pretty much the same story. Right now we're better off than 10 years ago, 30 years ago, and 40 years ago in terms of groceries.

Gas?

Adjusted for inflation:

1986— 58% less expensive than today
1996— 58% less expensive than today
2006— 16% more expensive than today
2016— 34% less expensive than today

So gas is legit. Only one time snapshot was more expensive than today, and the other snapshots were less expensive by a lot.

However, gas is more volatile than groceries, so let's do a year by year analysis. (Always) adjusted for inflation, there were two sustained periods in recent history when gas ended up higher than it is right now. And these were sustained over years, not months.

Between 2000-2008, gas prices roughly doubled in real dollars. Ended up around $4.50 a gallon in real dollars.

Then they went down briefly, only to explode again between 2009-2014. In fact, 2011-2013 was the most expensive sustained periods of gas prices in this 40 year analysis.

Rent? Yeah, that one's real. And it's linear. The farther you go back in time, the lower rent gets in real dollars. I'll bet we can figure out why.

Home prices?

This one is another one that is widely being manipulated badly by using bad statistics. Price doesn't tell you enough to gauge the situation...not by a long shot.

Because the interest rate matters greatly to home affordability, and the homes people buy now are much larger than homes people used to buy.

So "per square foot" gives us an apples to apples comparison on price, and factoring in the interest rates includes that crucial bit of data. When we look at it through that more comprehensive lens and adjust for inflation:



This is what we see.

Yeah, home prices have gone up by 68% since 2020. That's real.

But look at the 80s. This is what i have been trying to tell people here for a couple of years now. Other people had it as bad or worse when it comes to trying to buy your first home.

In fact, the reason it feels like such a bear for people looking at this short term is because between 2005 and 2020 it had been so low. And the reason is obvious...interest rates.

So do not believe the media—even online media—about this. Since everything has gone populist both the left and the right have a vested interest in stirring you up and telling you stuff that—upon investigation—isn't true. They have to make you into a victim, which is what populism is all about.

So if you are willing to consider how today's prices compare to other periods during our lifetime and not just the past 6 months, and if you're willing to consider data points that actually tell the truth instead of just provide grist for this narrative, then:

Gas, real, though not unprecedented, and we know it's temporary.

Rent, real, and we know that illegal immigration is driving it. It will get better if we can get more illegals out.

Groceries, total scam.

Home prices, total scam.

Stop falling for the nonsense. Look this stuff up yourself.

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You think people who go vote look at graphs?

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I think some people here who vote do.

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They see they cant afford jack shite.

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I honestly don't think that's true. Because we also know from the data that Americans have more disposable income now than we have had in our lifetimes, increasing at an almost 45 degree angle (plotted on a chart)-rate since I was born in 1970.

I don't think it's because of what they "see" at all. I think it's because of what they're being told. I think that's exactly why people my parent's age weren't wallowing in self-pity like young people are today...the interest rate was what it was. They just made their mortgage payments and budgeted accordingly (living much differently than people do today) and thought nothing more of it. They didn't have anybody telling them 24 hours a day how "bad" everything was.

Which is why I'm trying to tell the truth, not the populist victim fantasy.

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Americans' collective credit card debt stands at $1.26 trillion

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Without the context of how much of this debt is from discretionary spending, impossible for you to blame this on a "bad economy".

Credit card debt has been rising sharply for quite some time as the fiscally conservative boomers are replaced by less fiscally conservative Gen X and Gen Z who spends money like drunken sailors regardless of whether they have it or not.