Paul Campos has coined the term the “Ariana Grande Theory of Politics” by pointing out that most people who don’t follow politics know about as much politics as the average older person knows about pop music. I mean, I know Ariana Grande exists and is a singer, but that’s about it. That’s her in the photo above. I couldn’t pick her out of a lineup, and I certainly couldn’t name any of her songs. (And I do like a bunch of music created in the current century, but I don’t listen to what I assume is her genre, modern pop.)
Anyway, if you don’t think Campos is right, here are the dismal results of a Guardian poll:
- 55% believe the economy is shrinking, and 56% think the US is experiencing a recession, though the broadest measure of the economy, gross domestic product (GDP), has been growing.
- 49% believe the S&P 500 stock market index is down for the year, though the index went up about 24% in 2023 and is up more than 12% this year.
- 49% believe that unemployment is at a 50-year high, though the unemployment rate has been under 4%, a near 50-year low.
I don’t have a larger point here other than to say that this is the job for Democrats in every race: via ads, door knocking and all other modes of persuasion, to point out that the economy is doing pretty well. Our overall message needs to be dirt simple. Very little nuance is necessary. Do you want the women in your life to have access to abortions and birth control? Vote for the Democrats. Do you want rich fuckers to pay more taxes so you don’t have to? Vote for the Democrats. This isn’t complicated, and the Ezra Kleins of the world who would let Republicans tell bald-faced lies while they nitpick the details of everything that comes out of Biden’s mouth can just be totally ignored, since our target audience doesn’t read the New York Times and doesn’t listen to political podcasts.
If Ariana Grande isn’t the best example, pick someone else. For me it would be (pauses to google) Luka Dončić, current top scorer in the NBA.
Also, I know that a lot of the reason for those numbers is Fox News, but we can’t change that before the election, so here we are.
trollhattan
Hard to argue the point. Politics seem ubiquitous now and not organized around the election cycle and most folks are bored by/uninterested in/unaware of/sick of it, which breeds resentment and hatred of the ones right in front of them. Which ain’t good for incumbents, generally speaking.
Montanareddog
I get Campos’ point. But democracy, bodily autonomy, freedom of speech, elite probity, the sharing societal wealth more equitably, truth, honesty, decency etc. do not pivot on my knowledge of the Ariana Grande songbook.
Bill K
I much prefer looking at Ariana than Luka Dončić.
Steve in the ATL
It’s broader than that–do you want the women in your life to have access to basic women’s health care?
West of the Rockies
Christ, people are so ignorant (and yet sure of themselves).
Eyeroller
I can see where some of this misunderstanding might come from, but the news obsesses over the stock market so I can’t understand why half the population apparently “believes” the stock market is down. (They probably should just ask about the “stock market” and not about specific indexes like the S&P 500.) Unemployment numbers are also fairly widely reported. Of course you can immediately assume that roughly 40% of the public will say these things just from partisanship alone. You don’t have to follow “politics” to know what’s going on with the economy, broadly speaking, but those have gotten enmeshed in a lot of people’s minds, it would appear.
TheOtherHank
Something that Atrios points out quite often is that as Steve in the ATL says, basic health care for women is on the line. Think about how often part of the screening process is a question about “are you pregnant or planning to be pregnant in the future?” All those treatments are off the table in abortion-ban states since the doc administering them doesn’t want to go to jail for accidentally causing an abortion
HinTN
Instead of tax the rich I would hammer that 50% of the price increases that people notice every.fucking.day is due to corporate greed and price gouging. That’s an easy, concise and focused message right up there with women’s right to health care.
bbleh
I think it’s also worth repeating that a lot of people — and I would suspect especially a high percentage of MAGA cultists — tell pollsters what they want the pollsters to hear, not what they actually believe. And not to get too far into “unskewing” territory, but I generally just don’t put a lot of faith in polls taken in May, not least because normies are, well, normal, so they’re not glued to The Politics Channel 24/7. Come Labor Day, I’ll start paying attention.
hueyplong
This is always true several months before an election.
The question is whether we have passed into an era in which the voters will not form more accurate views as election day nears, because of FoxNews, social media fuckery, etc.
So far it looks like the Dems will have more money than the GOPers* with which to flood the airwaves with perception-correcting material, and they have Dobbs. Dems have done ok in each election since Dobbs, and I expect it to happen again.
*I saw an item (accuracy unknown) that says Trump has raised more than Biden during his trial, but the margin was nothing like the margins by which Biden was beating Trump in prior months. So I assume the Dems still hold a nice lead, and we all know Trump is spending a decent percentage of GOP money on lawyers as opposed to the campaign.
trollhattan
Bit more detail on the Calif bill allowing Arizona doctors to provide abortion services in state.
JCJ
@Bill K: Yeah, but can she make a 3/4 court alley-oop pass to Derrick Lively? I would rather watch Luka perform than Ms Grande.
smith
To be fair to those people misguided as to the state of the economy: Where would they get accurate information if they didn’t go looking for it? Both corporate media and Fox fantasy media have been systematically misinforming them, or at least burying good economic news, for the entirety of Biden’s term. Even people who believe they are keeping up with the news, maybe by watching a nightly newscast or glancing at a news aggregator online, are unlikely to have encountered much accurate information. And there are many people who don’t even do that — any impressions they pick up about these issues are probably pale reflections of what those people who casually glance at the news have passed on to them. Where is the opening for Dems to wedge any reality into their world?
Belafon
@Eyeroller: What percentage of the population do you think watches or reads any kind of news these days?
Eyeroller
@smith: I still get the dead-tree edition of the Washington Post and last Sunday there was a headline along the lines of “Spending Falls as Gloom Spreads: Price Increases Busting Budgets.” So that’s why people might think we’re in a recession when it was a natural and probably needed pullback from rather frenzied spending earlier. (I saw a post somewhere by an actual economist making this point.) If you are like most people and only read headlines, that’s not the impression you’d get. The framing is entirely negative–and wrong.
trollhattan
@Bill K:
@JCJ:
Marvin Bagley III. That’s who the Kings picked at #2 ahead of Doncic. Think we like hearing the name Luca here? Imagine him playing alongside DeAaron Fox and Doma Sabonis.
Les sigh.
Eyeroller
@Belafon: Depends on what you mean by “watches or reads.” A horrifyingly large fraction gets their “news” from Facebook feeds and they probably only read the headlines. I get “news” pushed at me constantly from Edge, my phone, etc., again just headlines unless I were to go to the trouble to click.
kindness
I read LG&M but I cringe at many of their pecidillos. They freak out over polling I see as distorted and inaccurate. Regularly. Maybe I’m an idiot or maybe it’s just that I don’t want to live my life in panic mode.
Steve in the ATL
@trollhattan: Michael Jordan went third in the 1984 draft! It’s an art, not a science. Unless you’re the Atlanta Falcons, in which case it’s annual malpractice.
Steve in the ATL
@kindness:
Hmmm…is it possible that these two items are connected?
Baud
People believe what they want to believe.
Steve in the ATL
@Baud:
I believe I can fly.
[callback to comment #19]
trollhattan
@Steve in the ATL:
Until rather recently the Kings’ draft history is a read-and-weep YA novel. That and the rotary coach selector.
Luckily, things have settled a bit. That only took two decades.
OzarkHillbilly
Garbage in, garbage out. I blame FOX, Newsmax, OAN, Sinclair radio, and the idiots who consume that crap.
Timill
@kindness: And he still can’t hit a curveball…
Though I did once see him walked (unintentionally) on four pitches.
JML
Ariana Grande is a reasonable pick, but I agree you could frequently pick any pop star. I mean, I like and listen to a lot of music, but I’m not very current and most people tend of stop ingesting new pop music after a while. And for people who don’t pay attention to politics, their knowledge base being similar makes sense to me. That said, not knowing who Ariana Grande is (I actually knew that one, and might have recognized her…or I might have confused her with someone else. but I at least knew the name and what she did) doesn’t really cause any harm, just shows you’re interested in other things. Not being politically aware and having the ability to sort the truth from lies in politics can sucker people into voting against their own interests.
I think about this in terms of taxes as well. It always stuns me the number of people who don’t understand what marginal tax brackets are. You’d be amazed how many people think that if the top tax bracket starts at $250K and has a rate of 50% how many people would believe that if they made $250,001 they would have to pay $125,000.50 in taxes…
smith
Meanwhile, back in the newsroom:
Dan Froomkin has some words for WaPo here. Basically, by bothsidesing the devolution of the Republican party into overt fascism, the Post, as well as FTFNYT, blew their chances at remaining relevant.
I was interested to see that WaPo has 2.5 million online subscribers. Meidas Touch has almost as many (2.4M) and Brian Tyler Cohen has more (2.77M). It may be an apples to oranges comparison, given the more limited scope and partisan viewpoint of the latter two, but it shows there’s a substantial audience for political news that doesn’t bend over backwards to make Republicans seem normal.
Baud
Via reddit
trollhattan
That it had to come to this is a story unto itself. Sliver of justice for Uvalde families.
matt
It’s not just Fox News – all big media are the enemy.
trollhattan
@Baud: An entirely different sort of Independence Day for Old Blighty. Sunak will be Just Fine no matter what.
The struggle is real.
Baud
Reddit is full of people (or bots) talking down the economy.
Anyway
@smith:
The internet broke the MSM’s ad model – and so far nothing’s bringing those revenues back.
different-church-lady
Jesus fuck, DO NOT AMPLIFY CAMPOS!!!
Shakti
My conclusion is that when the people talk about “the economy” it’s a Very Serious Person proxy for “vibes” or “my feelings about the world.” If they point out something specific like rent is insane bananas where I live and the inflation rate in my metro area is nuts, food prices are nuts and the wages aren’t increasing fast enough (hi Tampa Bay, and hi DeSantis for doing fuck all about it), then it’s not. Because living indoors and eating aren’t really optional activities.
I remember that very serious business show and news people were complaining about inflation in the context of talking about how near full employment and higher wages was a bad thing.
This feels like a tacit admission that the recovery from the 2008 recession was their ideal economy when they were complaining about it before with the “jobless recovery” and the depressed wages before the growth came all the way back.
Talking about the stock market is silliness when most people don’t even own that much in investments. Might as well talk about sports futures.
The Very Serious People have been predicting a recession for two years now so you might be forgiven for thinking it’s already happened. It hasn’t…but I’m waiting that housing bubble to pop. :-/
I think the economy is better than than many of the years after 2008; the 2020 recession.
To the extent the economy is fueled on credit though– the interest rates are absurdly high. I got an offer for a card with 17.00% APR and I did a credit report to make sure my credit wasn’t fucked. It’s not — this is an excellent rate for excellent credit now. That was an pay loan rate several years ago. (The WSJ Prime rate is now 8.5% so…)
Dan B
What I’m noticing is that Biden doesn’t do more than one press conference per season. FDR dud fireside chats. Whenever a president gives a press conference reporters are drawn like flies to honey (or carrion…they wish). Biden needs more face time with reporters to talk about what the administration is doing about price gouging post pandemic. And there are other topics – Dobbs, women’s health, birth control, how the US economy is doing fantastic compared to the rest of the world, etc. Weekly would be good, easy to remember when the word comes out. Social media still quotes what appears in print and on TV.
Melancholy Jaques
@Belafon:
I don’t have numbers, but local news is where most people get their news. Not sure if that viewership is down.
Anyway
people get their news from their phones…
smith
@Anyway: That may be true, but WaPo didn’t just lose revenue, it lost 50% of its audience. That suggests to me that the product they are selling is not as attractive as it once was.
Baud
@Shakti:
That’s not absurdly high for a credit card interest rate.
Geminid
@Baud: That’s good a time as any for a British election, it seems to me. I guess Sunak figures the Tories might as well get it over with.
Now we’ll get to see if early elections are called in Israel. If they are, it won’t happen as neatly as Sunak’s announcement, that’s for sure.
Melancholy Jaques
@trollhattan:
@Steve in the ATL:
The Atlanta Hawks drafted Doncic and traded him for Trae Young and one 1st round pick
Three time MVP Nikola Jokic was a 2nd round pick!
different-church-lady
@smith:
two things happened:
1) 2020 was an intense news year, so they’re measuring from a unique peak
2) The editorial went into a click-baity decline which turns off the core audience. The product deteriorated.
JCJ
@trollhattan: Well, at least the trade of Tyrese Halliburton for Domas turned out well for both the Kings and the Pacers
Baud
@Dan B:
I think Biden does a lot of local and alternative media.
Barbara
@smith: It doesn’t help to cling to a stable of old warhorse op-ed writers that people click through basically just to read the comments. WaPo is singularly bleak on that front. Even NYT hired a few new faces. Yeah, 2020 doesn’t seem like a fair benchmark — election plus Covid seem likely to have prompted very high user rates.
TBone
This Biden ad calling out the Nazi bullshit is 🔥📢😍😎
https://x.com/JoeBiden/status/1793021516818309427
rikyrah
@Dan B:
I miss what the Obama Communications Team did
” This Week at the White House”
Remember those?
Every week, we could point to those videos, to tell us what went on in the Obama White House. The Biden White House should have picked those back up. Having a library of content like that where you could just send links to all the doubters. Having in your face content like that in the back pocket would be helpful.
Baud
WaPo, via reddit
Bill Arnold
@HinTN:
This FRED chart of corporate profits is helpful for those data-inclined.
Corporate Profits After Tax (without IVA and CCAdj)
Pull the slider to just before 2020, and note what happens starting around 3Q2020.
Then one can ask why profits suddenly jumped a lot, and ask innocently what the causal relationship of certain actions resulting in increased profits might be to inflation.
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@different-church-lady:
Or anybody else at LGM, well mainly LeMeow and Gloomis.
Belafon
One thing I love about left political blogs is that we will still argue that an analogy is wrong even though we know that analogies aren’t 100% correct and we know that people like Paul Campos know that the analogy isn’t 100% correct and the information the analogy conveys we understand completely.
Bill Arnold
@different-church-lady:
Campos has been on a Biden-will-probably-win roll, recently FWIW.
different-church-lady
@Bill Arnold: He was, but he turned back about a week ago.
He’s a ninny. I’m sick of his constant fretting and turd picking.
Splitting Image
@Steve in the ATL:
LGM is fine when they stick to their bailiwick. Erik Loomis’ posts on labour history, for example, are generally accurate and informative, and something you won’t really find anywhere else on the ‘net.
That said, Loomis is an ass who spends far too much of his time worrying about what condiments people put on their hot dogs, what toppings they put on their pizza, and the possibility that young people might explore 1970s culture and decide they prefer disco to punk rock.
Ohio Mom
@kindness: I don’t know why, but I stopped over at LGM yesterday, after an absence of many months. It did nothing for my mood. Eeyore has nothing on that bunch.
Several posts insisted that there is a good possibility Trump is elected. I am agnostic on this subject — obviously I dread that possibility but I have no way of knowing how likely that is.
I do know that in previous times (both Bush Jr and Trump’s presidencies) I considered what my options were and came up with nothing. No other nation-state wants my family; Ohio Dad and I are retired, not exactly flush, and the youngest of us has a developmental disability. Okay, Israel would take us, that’s an obvious nonstarter.
I suspect that most normies feel similarly, even if they’ve given it no thought, they know intuitively that their options are limited. So what is the use of following the news?
That’s my attitude toward sports, it makes no difference to me who is ahead and who is behind and so I ignore all of it. Every now and then something breaks through — it’s Super Bowl Sunday or maybe the World Series. I usually have no idea who the teams are.
different-church-lady
@Baud: That people wanted to believe he was just doing play-fascism for his presidential run is so head-desk.
different-church-lady
@Splitting Image:
Dude long ago lost the distinction between being insightful and being opinionated.
Baud
@different-church-lady:
I stopped lurking there a long time ago. The next president will be Biden or Trump. I think it’s a waste of time trying to predict which one it will be. The liberal Internet versions of gender reveals.
rikyrah
Portia
McGonagal Same On
(@PortiaMcGonagal) posted at 10:53 AM on Tue, May 21, 2024:
I keep meaning to post this. The right makes NO secret of their goals for #Project2025. It is right there for everyone to see and read for themselves. It’s up to us to educate our circles because the media won’t do its duty to warn.
https://t.co/yaocepvT2R
(https://x.com/PortiaMcGonagal/status/1792946877941576069?t=SBK–73OYSGU3RiPsarwHA&s=03)
catclub
I would like a Biden ad that said “The economy is a whole hell of a lot better than it was when Reagan said it was morning in America. Better jobs, better inflation, better stock market.”
I think it would get attention.
trollhattan
@Bill Arnold: He recently won his battle against UofC Law School for egregious and discriminatory treatment that reads like some kind of revenge flick. His work over the years on law school fraudulent practices are valuable to anybody considering that path.
smith
I quit LGM not only because of all the Doomerism, but also so much pissiness over trivia! Bleh!
rikyrah
Uppity Black Faerie Gothmother of Metal
(@FountainPenDiva) posted at 5:25 PM on Tue, May 21, 2024:
The Heritage Foundation has been laying the foundation for #Project2025 for over 50 years.
They’ve been able to hide their agenda in plain sight, but now, with complicity from the Fourth Estate, they’re emboldened to lay it all out.
(https://x.com/FountainPenDiva/status/1793045369405755643?t=CTf_MUj3XbTI3DaJVNjfiw&s=03)
Ruckus
@West of the Rockies:
When there is less in the old breadbox upstairs there is less to spoil. There is also less to do the actual work of being human. Also I’d bet that the less one knows the less work it is to be sure of something, too bad it’s often that they know enough.
Belafon
@rikyrah: We will also be spending time educating people on how government is run. I guarantee most people don’t know how the process for hiring employees works and how civil employees do their jobs regardless of who is in charge.
Jay
@trollhattan:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-05-28/why-police-funding-makes-up-40-uvalde-s-city-budget
That’s annual.
Baud
@catclub:
Morning in America was 40 years ago.
gene108
The reality is whatever percentage of the population identifies as conservative will never believe things are good while a Democrat is President.
I don’t think there’s a way to solve for this. I think this century broke something in the souls of conservatives.
As “The Onion” pointed out, in 2012, After Obama Victory, Shrieking White-Hot Sphere Of Pure Rage Early GOP Front-Runner For 2016
Between 9/11, the failure of Bush, Jr’s terms in office, and the popularity and success of the Obamas, conservatives stopped believing in anything but rage and fictitious scenarios.
I don’t take polls on how people feel about the economy seriously. There’s a permanently disgruntled subset of the population, who live never acknowledge anything good happens under Democratic presidents.
The election polls showing it’s a close race scare the crap out of me. This election shouldn’t be this close.
Jeffro
Fox News is there to keep the “floor” of the GOP as high as possible. But these kinds of numbers? I lay that at the feet of a) mainstream ‘news’ organizations that have done nothing but crap all over President Biden for four years running, and b) the average American continuing to devolve towards “Idiocracy” by getting more and more of their ‘news’ (if they get any at all) from social media.
catclub
@Baud: I would expect 29 or 39% interest… and not care since I pay my balance.
MomSense
I just don’t know how people can be so dumb and uninformed. That so many people believe the opposite of reality is dismaying. Major fucking failure by our media that the population is so misinformed.
JoyceH
Feeling like a befuddled Old. What is LGM?
Baud
@JoyceH:
Lawyers Guns and Money blog.
catclub
@Baud: Still the most potent political ad made. I may have never seen it, but I sure know about it.
rikyrah
@Jay:
Many of them don’t live in the city that gives them a paycheck.
Many of them would be hard pressed to find a comparable paying jobs for their low skill set.
Belafon
@Jeffro: There’s also the fact that polls haven’t matched election results since Dobbs.
Baud
@catclub:
Republicans want to believe that a Republican president is good at the economy.
Democrats don’t want to believe the economy is good when not everyone is benefiting from it.
Barbara
@smith: It’s one of the signs that those who are posting don’t feel personally threatened by the outcome. IMHO. I don’t know why that is and I don’t care.
catclub
@Belafon: This. Predictions based on pre-Dobbs electorate are deeply flawed.
different-church-lady
@Baud: It’s totally a waste of time if one isn’t going to do anything to help.
gene108
@smith:
More to the point, the people willing to pay to read the NYT and WaPo are not conservatives. They aren’t all liberals, but are probably left of center on most social issues and some economic ones.
From the comments, it seems most are aware of the dangers of the modern Republican Party. If a mainstream news outlet acknowledged this in unequivocal language, they would get a large following.
Jon Stewart and Keith Olbermamn and even Bill Maher gained stardom beyond whatever basic cable shows they hosted, 20 years ago, because they were willing to point out how fucking stupid and wrong the Iraq War was and the bullshit Bush & Co. spewed.
Jay
@rikyrah:
Yup, but I was just comparing the one time $2 million dollar compensation paid to the those who lost members, and those injured, due to gross negligence on the part of the Police, to the annual Police budget of the small town.
Omnes Omnibus
@catclub: LBJ’s Daisy ad.*
*Obligatory “Fuck LBJ” for raven.
catclub
I know that, but should Biden run ads that come from that viewpoint if he wants to win undecided voters?
Jay
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/16/palestinian-lorry-drivers-israeli-settlers-attack-gaza-aid-convoy
Ruckus
@Ohio Mom:
I suspect that most normies feel similarly, even if they’ve given it no thought, they know intuitively that their options are limited. So what is the use of following the news?
I use to work full time in professional sports. Dealing with egos the size of Texas and not much smarter than the grass growing there really does bend one’s view of the world. I also had to travel a lot and therefore got to see much of the world when in the USN, which for me meant the opportunity to see a lot of Europe. And my take was that Europe is a lot different than the US, but the beings that live there are also humans so in many ways not as much different as it seemed. But the major difference I saw in the humans was the pompous arrogance of a sizable portion of the US population.
Steve in the ATL
@Ohio Mom:
NEED A WELLNESS CHECK IN CINCINNATI, STAT!@Splitting Image:
I agree wholeheartedly. And if he stopped there, I would be singing his praises. However….
@smith: thankfully, there is no pedantry here!
TBone
@Baud: O grasshopper you speak wisdom
Steve in the ATL
@JoyceH:
named after this classic Warren Zevon song
catclub
@Omnes Omnibus: I have less of a sense of the impact of the daisy ad. How much was Goldwater already seen as crazy? Not old enough. But yeah, those two and not much else. Third, well down, is Bush’s Willie Horton ad.
ObxRex
Almost 50% of the population gets their info from right wing media who feed them, daily, misinformation about our economy, crime rates, inflation, immigration, etc. That’s the only message they hear, so that’s what they believe. It’s difficult to crack thru that wall with the actual facts, but we must find a way.
smith
Only of the kindest, gentlest variety.
WaterGirl
@ObxRex: Welcome to commenting! Now that your first comment has been approved, your future comments will show up for everyone right away.
The Thin Black Duke
There are times when you don’t need the news to tell you What’s Goin’ On.
From my experience, whenever the GOP’s is behind the wheel, it’s a dangerous–and sometimes fatal–drunken joyride of ignoring the STOP signs while speeding on the wrong side of the road towards a dead end.
Whenever the Republicans are in power, prices go up and services get cut. Things never get better, they get worse. This happens every fucking time. The GOP’s belief system isn’t We, The People, it’s the Divine Right of Kings.
People choosing to remain ignorant about cause and effect in the voting booth ain’t got no excuse. It ain’t just Fox News.
catclub
@catclub: On thinking, I find it interesting that all those ads were noticed because the results looked like landslides. I think in a basically even race, coming up with a high impact ad is incredibly hard to do. Too many people have already decided.
“Mr Nobody came from behind and won because of that great ad,” is never said.
Old School
Of course not, but it does help explain why 49% of Democrats in the poll mentioned by mistermix answered that the economy is in a recession.
trnc
Some hangovers just won’t go away.
Steve in the ATL
@ObxRex: so true. I hear it everyday from blue collar union guys who should be Democrats, and white collar management guys who hate blue collar union guys and everything they stand for.
Too many are so steeped in the culture that they respond to everything with a RWNJ media diatribe. Drives me nuts. Et tu, HR guy? Seriously?
Bill Arnold
@TBone:
The replies on that Biden tweet are a glorious multicultural cesspool, dominated by paid-blue-check propagandists. There are “Biden ordered a hit on Trump” tweets next to “Genocide Joe” tweets.
Baud
@Old School:
Mostly because Dem voters are not as good as we’d like them to be. They just seem good compared to Republicans.
cain
I was on reddit explaining that american voters are the most emotional voters around. They would happily trade fascism if fascism will give them $2.50 gallon gas. They don’t give a fuck outside of their own comforts.
I realize that groceries bills and gas bills have gone up and salaries have been stagnant. But the solution is to raise salaries. Instead they seem to want to just do whatever the companies want. Let’s face it they are gouging us something fierce. Everything is being consolidated and then the money disappears into a hole as part of shareholder value.
I think we need to start thinking about breaking up industry leaders so that we can have some competition again. We’ve been allowing mergers and what not and it’s time it goes the other way.
Eyeroller
@ObxRex: Most don’t get it directly. The actual audience for Fox is small, and it’s even smaller for Newmax etc. Talk radio is probably a bigger factor. But so many of the themes are picked up and spread by “mainstream” sources, which in turn are spewed into social media.
Omnes Omnibus
@Old School: We see it here. If you say the economy is doing well, I guarantee that someone will bring up housing costs. The thing is doing well doesn’t mean performing flawlessly.
Baud
@cain:
Or maybe we respect the fact that people prefer a trickle down Reaganism economic model. It’s been with us since 1981, and it’s not like we’re Somalia. It works well enough (with occasional state support that we only talk about in quiet rooms).
AWOL
LGM? Site’s gone to shit: They have two or three pro-Israel commentators flooding their site with trollish paranoia. One clown posts apologia about 300 times a day.
Unreadable garbage.
Steve in the ATL
@cain:
I can’t speak for all sectors of the economy and income levels, but I can tell you that I have spent the last few years negotiating pay increases—some quite substantial—for union workers around the country. Manufacturers can’t keep their machines running without workers!
Jay
Saw a post yesterday on the Red Lobster Bankruptcy.
It wasn’t the “endless popcorn shrimp”.
It was VC’s taking over the company, selling off the Red Lobster locations* for cheap, to another of their own VC companies, (*which were owned by the chain),
then renting the locations back at 3X normal rents.
Just another Corporate Lampart.
Baud
@Steve in the ATL:
You’re just not very good at your job.
catclub
No, salaries have NOT been. Income gains under Biden have been highest among the lowest paid workers.
SpaceUnit
I am going to go out on a limb and assume that the percentages listed up top were also determined by. . . . (wait for it) . . . polls.
Sad trombone.
Also I’ve largely given up on LGM lately due to the persistent doomerism.
Steve in the ATL
@Baud: well duh!
Bill Arnold
@The Thin Black Duke:
Also, the USA reliably goes into a recession during during Republican presidencies.
(I hate recessions. Failures of capitalism, IMO)
catclub
@Steve in the ATL:
But probably overpaid and therefore causing inflation!
cain
@catclub:
Sure – and that’s absolutely fantastic.
You might be getting an increase, but does it match the delta of costs of goods? Is it matching the rate of increase? The premise is that people are unhappy with prices – they think there is inflation going on because what they are earning is not going as far as it used to.
My point here is that we should be increasing wages across the board. But also breaking up companies, stop them from buying homes – basically stop making everything into a stock index.
trollhattan
@Jay:
Sounding a little like the Sears and Penny’s fates.
Steve in the ATL
@catclub: the country’s economic problems are all my fault?! [sobs uncontrollably]*
*not really.
catclub
I do not really understand this desire. Look at it from the private seller’s viewpoint. It seems to me that the previous owner has willingly sold the house. Apparently, No private buyer has offered a better deal. They should turn down an offer because a company thinks their house is worth more than private buyers?
Old School
@Jay:
I saw someone say that the shrimp was bought at above market prices from another one of the VC owned companies.
karen marie
@gene108: “Subscribers” to a youtube channel are not in the same ballpark as paying subscribers to a newspaper read online.
karen marie
@Old School: The cost of shrimp for that one giveaway was the least of it. On its own, that wouldn’t have crashed the company. I think this is probably the referenced article – not terribly long but full of information.
catclub
things I did not really remember about the timeline of the classified documents case:
They had already convened a Grand Jury, months BEFORE the searches of Mar-a-Lago.
The model I thought applied was: FBI investigates and gets a search warrant. Hand case to prosecutor, prosecutor convenes GJ.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@catclub: Salaries have been stagnant for people who aren’t low wage and aren’t union. The newspaper industry is imploding. IT jobs are tanking because since everyone went remote, CEOs have realized they can just offshore most of the work. Yes, inflation has cooled. Yes, some industries are booming. Its a mix
IT was one of the few places people were guarenteed to make a good income.
Jay
@catclub:
Investment funds, VC’s and Corps, are buying up entire neighborhoods at over market rates, (100 to 350 houses at a time), turning them into rentals at above market rates. That is housing stock in the most needed sectors that will never be on the market for families again, unless your family can afford to buy 350 “affordable” houses at one time.
Investment funds, VC’s and Corps, are doing the same thing with Vet practices, then jacking the rates.
Jay
@Old School:
That is another standard Vulture Capitalist move, switch all services from supply chain to janitorial to VC or crony companies and jack up prices.
Baud
I should buy this blog and then jack up the price.
Steve in the ATL
@Baud: will you offer us endless shrimp?
Baud
@Steve in the ATL:
The way you people eat. Hell no.
Jay
https://nitter.poast.org/P_Kallioniemi?cursor=DAABCgABGONkkCx__-gKAAIY4vD-6BeBjQgAAwAAAAIAAA
different-church-lady
@catclub: Do we want affordability or don’t we?
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
He is very angry that his campaign was a colossal failure and he’s taking out on the world.
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
So, it makes sense that it’s now starting to get dark.
louc
A big driver of this perception is advertising. I see ads all the time about “how to get past inflation!” or how you can get a job in this economy! etc.
SamR
Haven’t look at this one, but in a recent poll people said they personally were doing well economically, and their state was doing well, but the country was doing poorly economically.
That’s just media bias. People are being subjected to so much negative information that even though they’re doing good and the people they know are doing good, they think beyond that things are bad.
Jay
Kroger’s profit was up 35.6% from ’22 to ’23. Publix was up 49% from ’22 to ’23. That’s why Food prices are so high. – The Other 98%
Kay
Admittedly my area of the country has done quite well w/all the manufacturing investment, but what never made sense to me about the “bad economy” narrative was how much people were spending. I don’t mean in the (dumb) sense of “stop buying lattes and you can afford a house” but higher ticket items like vacations and cars and recreational vehicles and home inprovements – my God, just the home inprovement acivity around here was and is off the charts. National parks are full to bursting. There’s an RV campground near my house near Lake Michigan and it is just jamming from March to October. I have younger neighbors these days and they are just pouring money into their houses. I’ve seen bad economies. People don’t spend like this.
Baud
@Kay:
Even if I were to credit the issue with prices, unemployment isn’t high and the stock market isn’t down. But that’s what the poll in the OP says people believe. How is that not grounded in gaslighting?
Manyakitty
@The Thin Black Duke: say it louder, for the ones who won’t listen
cain
@catclub: This isn’t a private seller – this is equity firms.
Plus they know their marks. Especially you are older, you can’t afford the mortgage payments or the property taxes so you’re forced to sell. They grab it and then rent it likely.
Every economic downturn is an opportunity to buy houses on the cheap. They can even go after new housing. My wife bought a house, just before we met, it went up $60k when she sold it nearly 5 months later. So she made an easy 30k or so after taxes.
cain
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony:
Gotta change jobs if you want to get an upgrade. Luckily my employer gave me a pretty good raise this year. But who knows what next year will be like?
The IT market is laying off people like nutso as well. So if you get laid off it’s difficult to find another job.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@Baud:
Jolly good. Jolly good.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@cain:
I’d vote for fascism if they banned the Dodgers
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@Steve in the ATL:
Turn Those Machines Back On!!!
Cheryl from Maryland
@catclub: Anecdotally, my godson graduated in December and got a placeholder job in February while he searches for a career job. He’s staying with me until he is on a moving forward track. Placeholder job is full-time, set hours, no on call, 55K a year with health insurance and paid leave (although personal days, not vacy and sick). So not too shabby, although we are in Montgomery County, MD. While apartment hunting for a STUDIO apartment, he has been rejected for not making enough income. CRAZY. At least this hasn’t turned him Trumpista.
Old School
@karen marie:
I saw the tidbit from somebody on Twitter, but that’s an interesting article. Thanks!
Shakti
@Baud: I know. It’s not an absurdly high rate for a credit card now. It would’ve been several years ago.
This is why I laugh and laugh when my car dealership keeps begging me to sell my car and get
financea new one. Or when any cashier tries to get me to apply for a store credit card. Not with these rates you’re not, even with perfect behavior assumed.I feel for anyone who has to get a new credit card out now to establish credit or improve their credit rating because yikes.
Quiltingfool
My husband and I own 2 rental houses in our rural Lake of the Ozarks area. They are not fancy — small farm houses, about 1100 sq feet, built in the 50’s (and the builders weren’t the best carpenters, ask me how I know, lol!). We charge $500/month, and we provide decent kitchen appliances and a washer and dryer! I think $500 is pricey, but my head is stuck in the 90’s.
Comparable rentals around here are $700-$800 or so a month, and wages haven’t gone up that much. My niece asked me if taxes or insurance have increased to justify higher rents. In my experience, no. My local taxes are reasonable and home insurance did go up, but nothing crazy.
I think people around here who have rentals have jacked up rent for two reasons; so many people need a place to live and because they can. Also, many rental homes around the lake have been turned into Airbnbs. So, the local workforce can’t find reasonably priced rentals.
We could raise rent, and not have any problem getting renters, BUT, we have good people renting from us, and I don’t want to be greedy. What good is money if your conscience is troubled.
El Muneco
@kindness: LGM is the blog that panics over daily news fluctuations so that other blogs don’t have to. If you want your daily dose, you know where to go, and you don’t need to drag it back anywhere else.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
Bingo
sab
Thanks for the explanation. I was wondering why Paul Campos was picking on Ariana Grande fans. I missed his April 2020 post when he first explained it. It makes perfect sense to me. I know people like that, and my obsession with politics drives them wild.