Why are Americans frustrated with the economy? The answer lies in grocery bills

No, it&#x27;s not grocery bills, it&#x27;s that post pandemic:<p>1. Used cars go for 50% more than they did before.<p>2. New cars are selling at or above MSRP.<p>3. Housing prices went up 30% or more where people want to buy.<p>4. Interest rates for loans to buy those overpriced houses are now 2-4 times what they were when those prices went up.<p>5. Rents have gone up and availability has gone down.<p>6. And yes, on top of that prices for everything have gone up, including groceries.<p>And how have salaries kept up with this? That&#x27;s right, they haven&#x27;t. The median income in 2019 was 27.7K and in 2021 went up to... wait for it... 28.8k. No inflation adjustment in there.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Personal_income_in_the_United_States" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Personal_income_in_the_United_...</a><p>This isn&#x27;t rocket science, why is it that financial and economic reporters seem so out of touch with reality? I have read and listened to multiple interviews that have the same theme of &quot;the percent gdp growth is good, people just think things are bad because they&#x27;re having an emotional reaction&quot;. People think things are bad because the average person can&#x27;t afford basic things.<p>29K a year is roughly $2,400 a month.<p>Average rent in the USA is $1,300 <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.forbes.com&#x2F;advisor&#x2F;mortgages&#x2F;average-rent-by-state&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.forbes.com&#x2F;advisor&#x2F;mortgages&#x2F;average-rent-by-sta...</a><p>Average car payment (on a used car) is $530 <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nerdwallet.com&#x2F;article&#x2F;loans&#x2F;auto-loans&#x2F;average-monthly-car-payment" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nerdwallet.com&#x2F;article&#x2F;loans&#x2F;auto-loans&#x2F;average-...</a><p>That leaves $570 for car insurance, health insurance, food, etc.<p>The math doesn&#x27;t add up for most people and it certainly doesn&#x27;t add up to being able to afford a more expensive things like a home, a new car, a family. People are frustrated because they look at the future and see forever renting, leasing, working low paying jobs, and never being able to live that lives that most before them did.

&gt;<i>— an economy that the professionals say is doing pretty well</i><p>The so-called &quot;professionals&quot; are simply useless, and guess what...people are figuring that out too.

It’s also been a long time since the Trustbusting times of Theodore Roosevelt and the Great Depression reforms have largely been repealed. Congress absolutely could act if the political will was reflected at the ballot box.<p>Elsewhere it’s been noted these scores don’t line up with how much is actually being purchased by people. There’s something else going on than just economics.<p>Otherwise, I deeply suffered from the Great Recession. Couldn’t find meaningful work for many years. This despite being well educated and qualified. I think we can agree these days are not those days: RE was cheaper. Food was cheaper. There just wasn’t enough demand for labor to employ people and thus fund demand. Trillions in RE “value” had to be marked to market and lost value. Trillions in debt were no longer ever going to be realized. Huge companies were facing bankruptcy and filed bankruptcy. At least one automaker had a sitting POTUS as its CEO for a while.<p>Nowadays, people do seem to be employed but prices have risen. We also have an ever growing war in one of the most important breadbaskets of the world. We knew that was going to raise global food prices.

The answer lies in monopoly.

Alternative hypothesis, its taking time for interest rates to hit commodity prices downward: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=38992091">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=38992091</a> , <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;scholar.harvard.edu&#x2F;frankel&#x2F;effects-interest-rates-commodity-prices" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;scholar.harvard.edu&#x2F;frankel&#x2F;effects-interest-rates-c...</a>

FINALLY someone notices.<p>Living in a small town with one grocery store, we&#x27;ve seen grocery prices up at least 25% from the Before Times.<p>On a fixed income, this is a very big deal.<p>Some level of food demand is not elastic: you have to eat.<p>National macroeconomic policy rarely affects domestic grocery prices. It&#x27;s hard to listen to political leaders who last shopped for groceries in the 20th century.

Our grocery bill hasn’t budged. No meat and no dairy maybe? I’d like to see data on the inflation across sections of food to understand this more.

These vibe check surveys feel like they’re guaranteed to generate specific results to me.

As an academic totally unrelated to economics this whole situation is just astounding. In my field we would say we failed and have the wrong metrics. In economics they say that people are delusional and the economy is actually good. Clearly economists are measuring the wrong things when they declare the economy is good.<p>Add to that one of the least affordable housing markets ever. Obscenely expensive childcare, far more expensive than it&#x27;s ever been to the point where it&#x27;s simply crushing for many.<p>The result is an economy where the basics: having a roof, kids, and food are a stretch for many. I don&#x27;t know a single person who reports the economy is good. I talk to kids around the university all the time and it&#x27;s normal now for them to have lost hope that they&#x27;ll be able to afford a house and kids.<p>All of this is made worse by Biden et al. selling this as a victory and so offering zero help.

Does anyone know anyone who&#x27;s really doing &quot;well&quot; right now? The highly paid tech workers in my circle are playing dodgeball with weekly layoffs, and on the other side, my friends doing blue-collar trade work say they are feeling the jobs dry up.<p>This is all happening while everything of course gets more expensive, especially staples like housing and food.

A sample size of 2k people on a subject like this? Not enough. You&#x27;re going to get wildly different results just based on where you ask.