Summary
President Joe Biden highlighted his administration’s economic record, citing consistent job growth and a 2.7% inflation rate drop from its 2022 peak.
December’s jobs report showed 256,000 new jobs and declining unemployment, signaling steady economic growth.
However, inflation remains above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, and interest rates remain high, impacting homebuyers and businesses.
Public pessimism lingers on affordability as Biden passes a largely strong economy to his successor, Donald Trump.
Thanks, Joe. More for Trump to loot. Too bad so little of that growth got to median-level people.
According to traditional economic indicators, that’s a true statement. There is an issue with traditional economic indicators however.
Yeah, great, I’m so impressed. I’ll quit one of my jobs. Thanks biden.
What good is that when we couldn’t sentence the clown coming into office that is going to dismantle whatever gains we might make.
That’s weird. I could have bought a house in 2014 but I can’t afford it now despite making way more money.
The economy is stronger than ever for Americans that politicians care about.
There’s also a part of this that could, if you were naive, be solved with time. My job gave me a solid raise last year, 4.9%. Assuming four years of Harris status quo could get inflation down to ~2.5%, and assuming I can maintain similar raises each year, I’d likely recover from the pandemic within the next four years. Inflation is a necessary evil, but when managed over time, it isn’t a big issue. Should work for everyone right, stupid Trumpies just don’t understand long-term economics!
Except it ignores that corporations are colluding in duopolies across many industries to steadily raise their prices above inflation to maintain profit growth. It ignores that landlords are treating maximum rent hikes as the expectation rather than the exception. It ignores that climate change is globally impacting our supply lines for food.
Inflation being healthy doesn’t mean a damn thing when unchecked capitalism is left rampant. The Biden administration, to their credit, did weakly try to fight corporate interests. However, they did nothing to fight the fully captured Supreme Court, which made Biden’s efforts so pitiful they resemble a controlled opposition.
Biden did elect a very effective FTC chair. She’s done some great work breaking monopolies and monopolistic practices.
The problem, as I alluded to, is that the Supreme Court is starting to hear the lawsuits filed in response to those policies and is striking them down as unconstitutional. It’s quite likely that things like NDAs being unenforceable will also get overturned.
Everything Biden accomplished has either been grossly undermined, hindered, or reversed by the current corrupt Supreme Court. Completely ignoring them for his full four years, especially after Roe V Wade, was pure incompetency. Again, it gives credence to the idea of a controlled opposition. He was allowed to say and do some progressive things, but anything that stepped over the line the Supreme Court would stop. He could have packed the courts, used the big public outcry against the courts legitimacy to pack it with additional judges, and actually make a meaningful change to our country’s fate.
Instead, Joe Biden will be remembered as a vain fool who gave the country to fascism. Nothing else he accomplished will matter, if any of it is still left.
Undermined by the supreme court? What is he supposed to do about that it’s a separate branch of government.
The only people to blame for trumps election is the people who voted for him or a 3rd party. Joe Biden will be remembered badly because the right wing were incredibly successful in getting their attacks to propagate through the pop culture.
President has the right to nominate more judges. And with control of the Senate, they could have been sworn in. He wasn’t helpless, he just chose not to use the power he had.
He cant usurp judges with no reason other than political alignment. The bar for getting rid of a judge is extremely high and has only been done once in the history of the US in 1800s. Biden did all that he could he nominated a great judge when Stephen Breyer stepped down. The things you ask of Biden are out of the realm of possibility.
Never said anything about getting rid of existing judges. Did you know there is NO RULE limiting the Supreme Court to 9 judges?
The Judiciary Act limits the amount of Judges.
Inflation is a necessary evil,
Only in a capitalist system, that requires the exploitation of labor…
It’s required in any system that uses a fiat currency. Maybe a fiat currency is evil incarnate, but it also offers a lot of conveniences. Personally, I think I’d prefer having some number that translates my labor into spending units, and fiat currency works about as well as anything else when carefully managed.
Personally, I think I’d prefer having some number that translates my labor into spending units
How about non-transferable labor vouchers?
Even in a system with fiat currency, inflation is not a requirement. Its only a requirement under a capitalist system, that demands profits rise constantly.
That’s because the economy is wholly disconnected from the real lives of working Americans. Aside from 401k, job gains could just be shifting around of people from job to job. If you are in the job market, it still feels grim. The cost of groceries, energy, housing, healthcare, schooling still remain high. And that’s what Americans really experience. A reduction in inflation doesn’t mean prices went down, it just means the increases slowed down by 2.7%. And the fact that democrats are completely incapable or unwilling to have this conversation, is why democrats continue to lose enthusiasm every time there’s an incumbent democrat election. Obama was an exception because of how skilled a politician he was and how weak the Republican opposition was at the time.
“What has the economy done for me lately?”
Hard to think of much lately other than give me false hope about my retirement options.
Doesn’t matter, when Trump wrecks the economy he will say that he inherited the worst economy ever from Biden.
He’s living in a separate economy 🙄 it’s no wonder the Dems lost.
I suppose I’m happy for the economy. I mean, I’m glad it’s doing better than ever, I guess, but I’ve got my own issues. Sorry if that sounds selfish, but it’s just hard for me to get too excited for the economy when I’m stressed about my own situation.
They made a typo they meant the stock market not the economy.
No no no, they added jobs*
*Uber drivers
That’s what happens when the economic wellbeing of a country is based upon numbers on computers instead of the actual wellbeing of its population. Fuck neoliberalism.
I dont see how we can’t actually quantify economic wellbeing, but I dont know of a unit for this.
Like we need something that takes into account wealth disparity. If your GDP goes up 5,000% and all that wealth goes into the pocket of a few people, the unit that measures economic welfare should be very low.
There are a number of general-welfare measures. Median inflation-adjusted income is a good one, then you can break that into deciles if you want more detail. The GINI coefficient gives a measure of income and/or wealth inequality within a society. Or if you want more effects-based metrics, there are all kinds of quality-of-life and satisfaction indices, with different relative weights for different contributing factors.
You can adjust GDP by Gini coefficient which measures income inequality. Eg. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequality-adjusted_income
I looked at the article, but I have no idea what “0.689” means.
What’s the unit abbreviation?
What does a high number mean? What does a low number mean?
Im not sure about the calculations for that specific value but the Gini coefficient itself is an index between 0 and 1 where 0 is no inequality and 1 is maximum inequality.
The index in the link I provided is also between 0 and 1 where the value for one country is only comparable to that of other countries. The higher the number the better but again not sure what the exact components are as it was just an example of quanitifying inequality.
Yeah, thats not an alternative to GDP then.
Like, if everyone in the country earns $1 per day and the cost of living is $2 per day, the gini is good but the economy is still shit
We need some unit that actually measures if an economy is doing well
GINI, GDP and PPP combined can get you at least a rough estimate.
Yeah. But we need one number to throw on a chart, make a ranking of all countries, and get the news and history books to say (instead of GDP)
I imagine this measurement is probably adjusted for PPP (purchase power parity). Going from comparing the GDP per capita to a PPP and Gini adjusted GDP per capita (like what that index likely does) should be what you’re getting at. Otherwise, there’s HDI (human development index) also mentioned in the wiki that goes beyond monetary value.
The economy should only be judged by the bottom 1% not the top.
That’s an interesting idea, but bottom 1% of what?
GDP usually looks at companies exports, not individuals. So you’re saying we should only calculate the GDP from the poorest 1% of companies? That seems like it would be wildly off.
I bet there are way smarter people should figure out how such an economy would work. (Humans have had a top down approach economically since forever.) but it’s obvious our relationship with top down approaches has changed. We need to come together and save humanity, because at this rate it’s obvious our ways of thinking are destroying ourselves and the world.
Average savings rate, average credit card debt, number of homeowners, college enrollment rates, average net worth. Lots of measures that the news and politicians ignore.
Some of the measures you cite are irrelevant to quality of life. For example, there’s only a weak correlation between rates of home ownership and overall quality-of-life metrics. For example, Switzerland scores high on quality of life measures but has quite a low home-ownership rate. The converse also applies. And savings rate can be driven by fear of post-requirement income insecurity, and average credit card debt matters less than the cost of borrowing (if your card providers only charge 2% a year, that’s a different picture than if they charge 25%).
Though your general observation still holds: the media (and politicians) focus on a small number of metrics that aren’t relevant to most people’s lives. You just have to be selective about what additional metrics you want to add to the mix.
Averages wouldn’t work. We need some unit that returns a low number if most of the wealth is in a small number of people’s pockets.
Consider a world where one country has 99% of the world’s wealth, and 99% of that wealth inside that country is held by 1 person, with everyone else literally struggling to feed themselves.
An average net worth for the country would show the country as having a very good economy. But, in fact, the economy is terrible. Because it benefits only one person. That’s a failed economy.
That number would be the median, which is a form of average.
In this theead: A whole lot of people who don’t understand that deflation is awful.
Deflation is fine. Plenty of countries have been through deflation and they haven’t exploded. Japan is probably the best example.
You mean that period of Japan that they call “the lost decades”. No one would ever want their economy to go through that.
You mean the decades their life expectancy actually grew? Japan showed that it can be managed. That it’s not this wild beast wall street would have you believe it is.
Really? Japanese life expectancy is the stat you’re going to pull up to justify this. Go take a look at the Japense life expectancy from 1950 to today and try and find the decade where their economy crashed. You cant because its a consistent increase not at all tied to their economic successes/failures.
Its not wall street saying this is bad its the bank of Japan.
The Japanese version of Wall Street disliking deflation is not the great point you think it is. And yeah if it was so bad you would see a drop in statistics like life expectancy. The fact that people were able to largely keep going with their lives means it’s not the apocalypse.
Im sorry to be rude but you have no idea what you are talking about you dont even know what the bank of Japan is. The bank of Japan is the Japanese central bank that monitors and controls Japans monetary policy. Its nothing like wall street which is an american stock exchange.
Also Life expectancy has so many contributing factors you cannot point to it and say “it didnt go down therefore this change was good”.
Oh I’m sorry, the financial elite. Happy?
And yeah there are a lot of factors. But one pretty universal one is a functioning economy.
‘Than Ever’
dude was a senator starting at 1972.
he’s been an active participant in this
Sure, a massive disaster caused by trump et all fucking things up was recovered from. But that’s not really Biden’s doing, except in the most ephemeral of senses
That link you provided is excellent.
yeah biden’s really asking for a lot of credit right now for just being an ordinary republican president. we needed to hold the insurrectionists accountable, first and foremost, and he didn’t
I thought the president didn’t have the power to do that. What could he do differently?
Fire Merrick Garland and appoint someone with teeth to go after the fucking ringleader?
Merrick Garland has been working to build a case against Trump. Trump delayed the cases. How can Merrick Garland’s replacement stop Trump from delaying cases?
Garland pretended to build a case, with zero intention of every trying to prosecute it.
Remember, Garland is a neocon too. He only got put up for SCOTUS because Obama was trying to make a point (That the GOP will never let him appoint a justice).
Biden acted like that never happened.
Garland pretended to build a case, with zero intention of every trying to prosecute it.
Where’s your proof that he only pretended to build a case?
There isn’t any. It’s a conspiracy theory.
Proof?
Did Garland ever lay charges for sedition? The evidence was right on TV for the entire global population to watch live…
The fact that he didn’t put Trump in prison for the crimes he was convicted of is the issue.
It doesn’t matter how he avoided it, he did because that’s what his rich masters wanted
Merrick Garland deferred to decorum at every turn. Knowing full well decorum is not an option in organized crime.
Just because a suspect twisted a political career into his organized crime does not mean it shouldn’t still be treated like organized crime regardless of the political optics.
What’s an example of Garland deferring to decorum?
Knowing full well decorum is not an option in organized crime.
It sounds like you’re saying Garland should’ve “gone rogue” or broken the law to take down Trump.
The same judicial system that gives Merrick Garland any authority has been corrupted with GOP picks that will rule in favor of Trump.
This is obvious sealioning.
Covid was China, how do you figure it’s Trump’s fault?
Tell him he did it… He finally “beat medicare” and can go rest.
The state with the highest GDP in America is literally on fire on his way out…
Do you think the President is Smokey the Bear or something?
Natural disaster! Must be that damn Biden’s fault! /s
I blame him for the genocide but not the fires.
To be fair… that State is on fire pretty regularly, the President has nothing to do with that, the shitty utilities not maintaining infrastructure properly are usually to blame.
Yup, California banned prescribed burning, and now they have bad wild fires every year.
