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Most of the places around me pay way less than the actual cost of living, like the average is maybe $12 an hour max but I'd say it's more like $10. Cost of living estimates vary but for a single adult it's often around $2500/month, which is far more than you'll make working at almost anywhere here full time. Even worse, most establishments are actually choosing to short-staff themselves to save money, so most aren't even looking to increase employment.
So you can work full time and still not have enough to just survive, then if you want to do university/trade school and aren't elligible for e.g. HOPE then you could have to pick up 2 full time jobs and still somehow have the time/energy left to do college (which most people wouldn't after that and would just drop out). Some people are able to live with family to reduce or eliminate the housing cost, and a few people are privileged enough to have their family pay for their whole college, but if that's not the case you're completely fucked.
And this is in suburban/rural Georgia. I can only imagine how shit it is for someone who can't afford college, a car, whatever else in a shitty place like Texas or Florida.
One of the things that frustrates me the most about this site (and reddit but it seems even worse here) is the inability of people to follow the context.
The article is about how people, wide spread, are rating the economy as poor despite good economic data. The top level comment is talking about not wanting deflation, but rising wages so they don't lose out to inflation. I point out that wages are rising and outpacing inflation, so by the metric they used the economy is doing well. Then someone inexplicably brings in the minimum wage (FTR, "Workers in the bottom pay quartile also saw median "real" income gains of 6% since 2019, more than the rest of the income distribution."[https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/us-job-market-softens-gains-minority-groups-hang-balance-2023-11-27/#:~:text=Workers%20in%20the%20bottom%20pay,rest%20of%20the%20income%20distribution] But who cares about the facts? They don't really mean anything anymore.). I point out that this isn't about the minimum wage (BTW, I agree that it should be raised) and people still go off on how in their anecdotal experience minimum wage is not enough to get by.
It's like anything to ignore reality. It's the same ridiculousness I see from conservatives when I'm debating climate change: just ignore the facts, cherry-pick some data, throw in some anecdotes, and try to reframe the debate.
It's the subjective experience of not seeing the wage growth themselves, combined with things not being acceptable for a longer time than Biden or Trump's presidency. Things are improving right now, but haven't caught up to people having economic security. When you've sunk deep enough, it takes a longer period of rising to finally catch a breath. Basically, the current growth must sustain for longer to get more people into a good position. If things continue on their current path, people will calm down.
It's also true that necessities like housing have inflated in price far faster than other goods, again, for longer than a decade. Unnecessary goods might be cheaper than ever, but you NEED things like shelter and there are NO alternatives. Despite good competition, the demand is inelastic, so limited excess supply translates to soaring prices, plus, other factors are at play.
It also isn't a good idea ignore subjective experiences in general. Not only are people almost always right to be unhappy on some level, invalidating their lived experiences isn't a good idea. Democrats will not be successful if they don't listen to people's displeasure. Basic economic measures are essential, but not sufficient to make voters happier.
There's not much I disagree with in your post. However, this all stems from a poster saying that (effectively) they don't want deflation, but for wages to out-pace inflation, and I pointed out that this is already happening. By their own metric they should be happy with the economy, even if they haven't personally benefitted from it, but instead they are unhappy with it but that's based on a false belief.
And this is basically what the article is all about, that the economy is actually going in the right direction, but everyone thinks it isn't. Spreading the false belief that we are still in situation where inflation is out-pacing wages is just further spreading the false belief that is making people upset. I get that people still have a ways to go before they make up for what was lost to inflation, but being constantly grim about the state of the economy for bad reasons isn't helping anyone. It's probably just making it worse.
Okay, so this actually misses how this "false belief" has spread.
The thing about inflation is it doesn't go away when it goes down. There hasn't been deflation, so when prices rose they just stayed high even as inflation cooled. It doesn't matter that prices aren't rising as fast as they were before because the prices are still high. Wages, on the other hand, lagged behind inflation for so long that they're still behind even if the rates are more even now. This has to keep up for several years to give wages have time to catch up; until then people are still going to be mad about inflation even if it is getting better.
This is what I meant when I said:
But, again, the claim is that they just want wages that won't be beaten by inflation (again, effectively) and that is the case now. So what they want is what is happening now, yet still unhappy. Your post is a movement of the goal-posts. I get it that it still sucks, but we're going in the right direction, especially on the point they made. This should result in a more cheery-outlook for people basing their opinion on wages out-pacing inflation.
They want the pain to stop now. That's my point. Only people with a financial cushion can sit around and wait for things to get better, everyone else is suffering. People are not going to be patient for relief.