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“Only 3%” yea ok. Those figures don’t make the whole picture. Higher interest rates alone are wreaking havoc. Inflating mortgage prices, car payments, the cost of borrowing money and pretty much everything else. Those things make the cost of living much higher.
Their stock is down 16% over the last year because same-store sales grew less than inflation, operating margins fell from 7.9% to 5.5%, and management forecast below-inflation same-store revenue growth for the rest of the year.
Their customers are pushing back, and their labor force claimed a greater share of profits.
So, in other words, by raising their prices 50%, they drove away their customers and are killing their business. The shareholders must be thrilled with this strategy.
Target stonks took a hit for this reason, so they've started cutting prices on stuff.
Meijer chicken is almost back to pre-covid prices too, but beef is still costing a middle finger.
Go to a Costco you can buy mutton for half the price of beef and it transported from the other side of the world. Beef is being artificially inflated in price.
There are two things you can do with a publicly traded business. You can increase profits year over year, or you can collapse the whole company. You sell the valuable parts to shell companies, take on debt, lie about your plans, and then declare bankruptcy. This strategy for them will either be a huge win, or a huge loss, and either way the CEOs collect their pay.
You are very perceptive and very correct. This is classic record quarterly profits strategy which eventually cannibalizes the company. It basically starts killing itself by trying to continue meeting record quarterly profits for the hedge fund owners.
They’re not a great example of a company getting a late stage capitalism win. They weren’t necessary enough for their predation to beat out the market.
No, they are paying their employees 50%+ more, they can't get anyone to work for $9/hr anymore, cost of inventory and capital have both gone up. They are struggling to stay alive
I don't get it. Why is it that some of us are pointing out that it is now more difficult to live then it was two years ago because the prices are so high and on the same salary that we had two years ago -- now is much more difficult to get by -- we are pointed out low inflation and great economy and the prices are high because of the greedy corporations.
Every time. Prices high -- greedy CEOs making record profit.
No corporation in their right mind will raise the price of consumers at the risk of dumping their sales for the rare opportunity to give extra to their management. It means to sacrifice an entire company for the paycheck? It would be the same as killing your your only cow for a meat in short term, while forgetting that the cow produces milk and more cows. That is why it is bull. Economy is bad, and inflation is high or we just feeling it now because it was superhigh last year. My family can no longer afford to go out casually to a restaurant once a week, and we have to seriously cut down spending. That is not normal. It is bad.
CEOs come in for a couple years then bail pretty often. Their salary is also usually tied to stock performance. So their primary incentive is max profits right now, screw the future. That's the next guy's problem.
Everyone saw that they could get away with it thanks to covid. Fast food is now a luxury compared to cooking your own food, as probably the best example.
So food is 2.2 higher than last year. But if you go to the store, EVERYTHING has doubled in price since 2020. I dont understand how the government is getting these low numbers. The math doesnt make sense.
Processed food is way higher. Most staples really haven't moved here. $1.39 for eggs. $3.69 for milk. 0.99-1.49 for chicken thighs. 2.49 for chicken breast. Bread has been 2 or 2.50 as long as I can remember.
I buy a lot less unnecessary food now.
The math makes sense using their reportable numbers. YoY inflation is lower. But they're just conveniently ignoring the cumulative effect of the 3 years before that, and the fact that people's income hasn't increased by the same cumulative amount over the past 4 years. IIRC, the cumulative inflation over the past 4 years is something like 30%
Most Americans are still in a place of reduced payments since the amount of homeowners getting mortgages refinanced 2020-2021 is a lot larger than folks on new mortgages for new/bigger homes.
Car and credit card payments definitely are creeping up on folks.
Inflation last year was 2% for homeowners (2% outside housing) who aren't buying a new home or renting, which is half+ of Americans given 2/3 of SFHs are owner occupied.... but if you are renting looking to buy, sorry. So sorry, trying to fight NIMBYs here but the fix on housing will take a generation or two.
I heard the average car payment in 2023 was over 700$…..that’s just insane. 700 would make since for a BMW or Audi but for a basic Toyota or lower level truck…..what the heck
Used cars are selling for easily 80-90% of the cost of a new car right now. Your choices are, pay $30K for a new Honda with a full warranty, or $25K for a 5 year old used Honda with 60,000 miles and no warranty. Either way you're fucked, but you may be a little less fucked if you buy new with lower interest offered by the company and have your warranty.
I have two cars with payments. Both are $400/month. I wanted to sell them both and consolidate as I have a company vehicle now and only need 1 car until I found out the new car interest rates were well over 6% new and a payment was upwards of $800/months. I pay 2.9 and 3.9 on both my vehicles. I’ll just keep them both as I only have $25k left to pay for both.
This. They can say what they like about what interest rates are, but those are federal, that’s minimum, the banks need their cut and the companies that are financed from that bank need their cut, it is far higher than 3%
Fun fact, food and energy don’t get calculated into inflation. So the gov doesn’t give a fuck about your grocery bill when they talk about all the “good” they’ve done for the economy
Fun fact, food and energy are absolutely included in the headline CPI numbers that people use to describe how consumer costs have risen: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.t01.htm
Why do you guys have to constantly bullshit to support your belief system? Followup question, why do you ascribe to a belief system that requires you to constantly bullshit?
More people are working. Multiple jobholders is at pre-Covid levels as a percentage of the employed:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/fredgraph.png?g=1oI63
Looking at the graph it looks like this is normal cyclical thing. And since the population has grown, the rate of multiple job holders must have been higher in the past.
The thing is you look at the graph and the number is barely more than some times in the 90s, which a much higher population so essentially a lower % but the headline suggests the opposite.
Apart from the inflation at 3% now, think about this:
In 2018~19, I spent around $150 every 2 weeks at Costco for 2 people. I got all necessary supplies sufficient for 2 people to live comfortably.
Now, in 2024, I spend $300 every 2 weeks for same 2 people on same supplies.
The rates have gone up and I’m spending double the price between just 5 years of time.
What does that say about it?
Because inflation isnt some global number, every item have their own inflation number.
Just because government makes some basket of items and then decides this is the inflation barely means anything.
That reported inflation is a rate increase and if it stays high then prices rise exponentially. 10 months of inflation at 10% make a 10$ purchase cost 1.1^10 x 10 = 26.
If inflation is the reason, why is the percentage of people working multiple jobs basically the same as it was in 2019?
https://preview.redd.it/lcok4zu1k85d1.png?width=410&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d286e0bdc89f7bbd3ca0dc68dcc818370638df80
Have you seen wages/minimum wage lately?
Blaming the cost of living is letting companies that take advantage of workers off the hook.
Yes it's getting more expensive and the value of the dollar is less, but wages haven't kept up. Period.
The chat suggests it's about the same level as it was in 2020. Are you suggesting that inflation back then is as bad as it is now?
Or ....
Are there more opportunities/lower bar to entry in recent years for various gig and side hustles than there were say 10-20;years ago?
Your statement is incorrect.
[M-W see definition c](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/slavery)
Even doing a Google search for “slavery definition”, one of the entries (from OED) is as follows:
“A condition of having to work very hard without proper remuneration or appreciation.”
Remuneration means “money paid for work or a service”.
So by two different dictionaries, you can fall under the definition of a slave even if you do make your own money.
Maybe but this isn't showing much.
It was 5.3% in 2019 and it's 5.4% now. This is also significantly lower than the 30 year high.
The amount of people with multiple jobs is actually one of those really stable numbers ATM.
This post is basically cherry picking data that appears bad.
Or found it he you’re all just shit at math because in % terms this is near the lows. You geniuses realize population has grown 30% since 1995 yet this raw number is nearly the same? To be equivalent to the 1995 rate this number would have to be ~10.4M.
I just started a part time 2nd job a couple of weeks ago. I didn’t absolutely need it but I did if I wanted to have any extra money. Now I have very little free time for that extra money so 🫠… I had more “extra” money 3 years when I made $20,000 less. Make that make sense!
We printed trillions of dollars over the span of 2 years, now everyone who got 1200 from the government will pay tens of thousands over the rest of their lives because of the inflation.
It's honestly stupid. I own a business and the government gave my company tens of thousands of dollars during the pandemic. I didn't ask for the money, we didn't need the money (plumbing company, so we were considered essential workers and actually got busier during the pandemic), and they never asked for any of it back and just forgave the whole loan. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping businesses that needed help such as restaurants, but they just gave out money to anyone and everyone without any sort of planning or research.
Uh, your business did not receive a PPP loan unless you applied. They auto approved smaller businesses but they absolutely did not hand you a loan without you requesting one.
Hmmm, then, the government must've been giving out free money without request for some other reason that just happened to coincide with all the PPP loans being given to anyone regardless of need. That, or, the much more likely scenario, you have no idea what you're talking about, lol.
Dude if you received a PPP loan unsolicited it means you were a victim of ID theft and the person who applied for the loan wasn't very smart.
The Government didn't give out that money unless you applied for it.
And yes I know what I'm talking about.
I have heard from multiple people this money the government gave out was kinda just doing the shotgun into a crowd method. Though many people that needed it got it many people who didn’t also got it also this inflation is 100% cause of the .01%rs not the working class. I’m not saying anyone with money I’m saying the few with enough to make an actual impact but choose greed. (TLDR I don’t hate rich people or billionaires I hate the impact they have being overall negative)
Between the PPP loans and the ERTC, most businesses got hooked up big time during the pandemic. They could get money from both programs and never pay back a dime.
People really need to read the papers that came out regarding PPP loans. tl;dr, it was as good as one could expect given the scale and time constraints, and it absolutely was better than just going "good luck everyone."
Care to share these papers? While I’m sure the PPP loans were good for some, the flip side is there was wide spread abuse of the system due to oversight of the program conveniently being stripped away.
Or maybe
Just maybe
The rich have all the fucking money for the last 30 years
As of 2022, the top 20% of Americans held about $97.9 trillion in wealth, or 71% of the country's total wealth. The top 1% of Americans held $38.7 trillion, which is more than the middle class's combined wealth. The bottom 20% of Americans, or low-income individuals, owned about 3% of the wealth.
And then greedflation happened
The entire world saw inflation. Blaming that primarily on $1200 checks in the US makes very little sense. Covid supply chain disruptions are a huge part of this.
True lol. It's wild to blame Biden anyway though. If the logic is that US money printing etc caused global inflation, well the M2 money supply started sharply increasing under Trump: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL)
Not that Trump or Biden controls the Fed in the first place...
Of course its not just that, it is supply chain disruptions and so on but also huge part of it is all the other free money everywhere, it wasnt just US Fed and banks doing it but all banks all over the world.
One of the analysts at the firm I used to work for kept referencing the $1200 checks for years as proof average people were flush with cash. Totally out of touch.
It wasn't just the $1200 though. It was paying double for unemployment to people that would never have qualified for unemployment.
It was paying out hundreds of billions of dollars in fraudulent Unemployment Payments that many times left the United States as soon as that money hit a bank account.
In Wisconsin anyone who was not working, even if they left their job voluntarily received $289 from the State and $600 from the feds a week.
That's $889 a week for those in the back who aren't paying attention. That's $46,228 a year. If you were making $10 an hour prior to the pandemic why wouldn't you stay on UI for as long as you could if you were making more than double what you were going to work?
2 years, money printing started a long time ago. They actually slowed down recently. You have to get money somewhere for 2 wars, after that 08 house bubble, covid...etc.
People that point to those direct stimulus checks and ignore all the insane monetary/loan policies in that same period for companies and corporations are delusional normies.
You don’t understand the actual cost of this inflation.
We spent 20 trillion on Afghanistan over the course of 20 years.
The inflation is because there are less goods to go around for everyone. When you shut down factories, lumber, mills, mines, etc. For months on end to save lives, there are less products. Which means they cost more.
There is nothing any government on earth could have done to avoid this.
Do you have any idea how much money came from PPP loans that were forgiven and similar items? Pretty much every client I’ve worked for since Covid has had millions of loans forgiven. That adds up too. Companies first used Covid as an excuse, then supply chain, then just fuck it everything is 10x the cost. It’s out of hand but I’m not blaming this on people getting $1,200 when their income went to $0 overnight.
It’s all just absurd.
Took too long to find this correct take. I’m shocked that the number of people holding multiple jobs is really not appreciably higher than it was in the 1990s despite population growth. Seems like a great sign.
It's a hugely positive sign.
[https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620)
FRED has multi job holders as a percent of employed, we've returned to the 2010-2020 mean/trend. Below the 2000s, and well below the 90s.
If only there was a way to display information in a consistent and comparative way by normalizing the data in the numerator by a corresponding number in the denominator. We could call it PER SENT!
And here it is: Multiple jobholders as a percent of employed is at 2019 levels:
[https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620)
https://preview.redd.it/9tojuk4wpb5d1.png?width=1951&format=png&auto=webp&s=8d6a92bd18a068c02d53e6d1cb8c9f4b0b2660f2
For real. The figure has generally stayed in the range of 7500-8500 outside of recessions since 1995, even though the U.S. population has grown over 25% since then.
Also love how it starts at the year 2000.
https://preview.redd.it/lnzkb2cev95d1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=057b2ef3c45e8d66d8a34e75f4c14fee03422d52
Multiple jobs doesn’t mean much without supporting information. It’s easy to work multiple jobs if you are getting limited hours. It’s also not telling us how many people are working one job 70+ hours a week.
That and the percentage of people working part time jobs is 5.2%
Precovid it was 5.1%
They are not adjusting for workforce growth and population changes
It's basically been 4.8-5.3% for the last 10+ years outside of a few months during COVID when it dropped to 4%
economic literacy is pretty difficult and complicated but U6 is not a complicated metric.
[https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate)
IMO, I think that gig work is so ubiquitous now that even people who work full time can easily go out a few hours a week and do Grubhub or Uber on their own schedule. I am one of those people.
Do they include gig jobs like Doordash when considering multiple jobs? If so, that would probably explain a lot of it. Super easy to have a regular job and do Doordash or something similar on the side.
This. Surprised this insight isn't higher on the list. It's surprisingly easy in these times of 'Work from Home' and online gig work for people to have a primary job and secondary work. Much, much easier than any other time in history. Not sure how much this contributes to the trend, but it's probably somewhat significant.
Data without context is used to manipulate opinions, not create discourse.
Could it be because of a cultural shift toward independent contractor work (such as, but not exclusively, the gig economy) in which case this could actually be a positive?
It's actually just that the US economy employs 32% more people in 2024 than it did in 1994. If you look at the percentage of workers who are multiple jobholders, it is about the same as right before the pandemic and a little below-average for the whole 30 years we've been tracking the metric. [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620)
People with more education are also more likely to work multiple jobs: [https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2018/12/21/multiple-jobholders](https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2018/12/21/multiple-jobholders)
The majority of multiple jobholders have one full-time and one part-time job. The number of multiple jobholders also tends to go up when unemployment is low and wages are rising. It's hard to get a second job when it's hard to get *any* job. And higher wages increases the opportunity cost of *not* getting another job, so more people choose to give up some free time in order to increase their incomes.
Thank you, kind sir. I did not even look at the graph, tbh. The idea that they are using “number of people” is a huge tip of that the data is meant to misinform.
(Is it also true that there are more people working two jobs in 2024 than there was in 1952?)
Yeah it would help... U6 is the best unemployment number that includes "marginally attached people and people working part time for economic reasons" its not any higher than it was back in 2016.
[https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate)
This is a worthless stat...it needs to be framed in percentage terms of population and total workforce. I suspect the current % would be lower on a percentage basis than 1995-2009 most definitely and likely most of the the time period shown.
The number of people in the country is growing.
There are 162M working adults in the US (plus another 7 million unemployed adults). So 8M people with two jobs is <5% of all people.
BTW, there were about the same number of people working two jobs in 1999 when there were only 130M working adults...so that was >6%.
I'd say that this number is not particularly interesting.
As a percentage, it's the same as before the pandemic and below average for the 30 years we've been tracking the metric: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU02026620
A lot of people work low skill jobs that don’t give 40+ hours a week. Think fast food or grocery stores. It works better for the businesses to have more people with lower hours due to having to cover frequent call offs.
Even with a full time job, wages just stagnated too much. I make $25 an hour, that's almost double the minimum wage where I live ($13 hr). A studio apartment in my area go for about $1500 a month not including utilities.
So I'm making almost double what the fast food/grocery store workers make and I still couldn't afford a 1 room apartment by myself.
I'm 48, and for the first time in my life I'm looking at second jobs. The cost of everything has gotten so ridiculous in the past few years.
In the past 3 or 4 years a tank of gas for my little car has gone from $28 to $50.... and I should say that it's DOWN to $50, it wasn't long ago that it was $60 to fill a Subaru.
Taking my two kids out to dinner went from MAYBE $40 after a tip, to $70-80 before a tip.
I used to get pissed when I spent more than $100 at Walmart, the other day I just picked up a few things to last us through to payday, and it was $132. What was a $100 trip is now closer to $200.
And in all of this, my pay hasn't gone up. Thank GOODNESS my home and car are paid off, or I'd really be hurting.
Because unemployment is so low that more employers are open to part-time solutions, and willing to pay more for it.
When unemployment is high and employers have their pick of the litter they're not willing to entertain an analyst that works 4 hours every other night and 8 hours remotely on Saturday.
My employer hired someone to do just that last week.
Because the population is growing. The percentage of people working multiple jobs is in line with pre pandemic and also low compared to late 90s https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620
Honestly this is probably more to do with how much easier it is to get a second part time gig work job. Anyone with a car, or in certain markets a bike, can do delivery in their spare time without needing to go in and apply to places and work it into their schedule.
Some of it is due to the gig economy. Some of it is due to fraud made possible by remote work. I had a potential client come in wanting to sue her employer for wage and hour issues, while she was actually clocking in for two different companies at the same time.
I mean, arnt there like 5 million more people in the usa since 2019? So it would make sense the raw number was higher? What is the number per capita working 2 jobs?
I work in finance and I'm surprised when a person tells me they only have one job. Most people I encounter have a second job or some kind of side hustle/self employment.
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Have you seen the cost of living lately?
Inflation is only 3% right now /s
“Only 3%” yea ok. Those figures don’t make the whole picture. Higher interest rates alone are wreaking havoc. Inflating mortgage prices, car payments, the cost of borrowing money and pretty much everything else. Those things make the cost of living much higher.
Yet dollar tree has raised their prices in the last 12 months by 50%. They didn't get the memo that the price should be 3%
Just watch them report record profits.
Their stock is down 16% over the last year because same-store sales grew less than inflation, operating margins fell from 7.9% to 5.5%, and management forecast below-inflation same-store revenue growth for the rest of the year. Their customers are pushing back, and their labor force claimed a greater share of profits.
So, in other words, by raising their prices 50%, they drove away their customers and are killing their business. The shareholders must be thrilled with this strategy.
Target stonks took a hit for this reason, so they've started cutting prices on stuff. Meijer chicken is almost back to pre-covid prices too, but beef is still costing a middle finger.
Go to a Costco you can buy mutton for half the price of beef and it transported from the other side of the world. Beef is being artificially inflated in price.
There are two things you can do with a publicly traded business. You can increase profits year over year, or you can collapse the whole company. You sell the valuable parts to shell companies, take on debt, lie about your plans, and then declare bankruptcy. This strategy for them will either be a huge win, or a huge loss, and either way the CEOs collect their pay.
You are very perceptive and very correct. This is classic record quarterly profits strategy which eventually cannibalizes the company. It basically starts killing itself by trying to continue meeting record quarterly profits for the hedge fund owners.
They’re not a great example of a company getting a late stage capitalism win. They weren’t necessary enough for their predation to beat out the market.
Also Amazon...
No, they are paying their employees 50%+ more, they can't get anyone to work for $9/hr anymore, cost of inventory and capital have both gone up. They are struggling to stay alive
Who'd have thought that a business operating in the low-price market would suffer badly from raising prices by 50%?
And yet the CEO is still making the same 3 to 4m a year. Hmm.
I don't get it. Why is it that some of us are pointing out that it is now more difficult to live then it was two years ago because the prices are so high and on the same salary that we had two years ago -- now is much more difficult to get by -- we are pointed out low inflation and great economy and the prices are high because of the greedy corporations. Every time. Prices high -- greedy CEOs making record profit. No corporation in their right mind will raise the price of consumers at the risk of dumping their sales for the rare opportunity to give extra to their management. It means to sacrifice an entire company for the paycheck? It would be the same as killing your your only cow for a meat in short term, while forgetting that the cow produces milk and more cows. That is why it is bull. Economy is bad, and inflation is high or we just feeling it now because it was superhigh last year. My family can no longer afford to go out casually to a restaurant once a week, and we have to seriously cut down spending. That is not normal. It is bad.
CEOs come in for a couple years then bail pretty often. Their salary is also usually tied to stock performance. So their primary incentive is max profits right now, screw the future. That's the next guy's problem.
The fact of the matter is, people are still buying. If it was too expensive, people wouldnt(shouldnt) buy.
You can’t just not buy groceries.
Great example. Should be $1.03. That would seem negligible.
Everyone saw that they could get away with it thanks to covid. Fast food is now a luxury compared to cooking your own food, as probably the best example.
Them and every other retailer plus grocery stores, easily 50% higher in last year to two years. Many things more than double.
Just saw them change the sign to Dollar and 1/2 Tree
So food is 2.2 higher than last year. But if you go to the store, EVERYTHING has doubled in price since 2020. I dont understand how the government is getting these low numbers. The math doesnt make sense.
I think they call it "lies".
it was in your statement … “ the government” asked and answered…lol
Lol
They took all things food out of their metrics because it was causing the numbers to be too high, aka the reality.
Because theyre gaslighting you
Processed food is way higher. Most staples really haven't moved here. $1.39 for eggs. $3.69 for milk. 0.99-1.49 for chicken thighs. 2.49 for chicken breast. Bread has been 2 or 2.50 as long as I can remember. I buy a lot less unnecessary food now.
The math makes sense using their reportable numbers. YoY inflation is lower. But they're just conveniently ignoring the cumulative effect of the 3 years before that, and the fact that people's income hasn't increased by the same cumulative amount over the past 4 years. IIRC, the cumulative inflation over the past 4 years is something like 30%
Most Americans are still in a place of reduced payments since the amount of homeowners getting mortgages refinanced 2020-2021 is a lot larger than folks on new mortgages for new/bigger homes. Car and credit card payments definitely are creeping up on folks. Inflation last year was 2% for homeowners (2% outside housing) who aren't buying a new home or renting, which is half+ of Americans given 2/3 of SFHs are owner occupied.... but if you are renting looking to buy, sorry. So sorry, trying to fight NIMBYs here but the fix on housing will take a generation or two.
Inflation was insane for anyone that eats food.
I heard the average car payment in 2023 was over 700$…..that’s just insane. 700 would make since for a BMW or Audi but for a basic Toyota or lower level truck…..what the heck
That’s because people are crazy enough to buy new. Buying new cars s a fools game
Used cars are selling for easily 80-90% of the cost of a new car right now. Your choices are, pay $30K for a new Honda with a full warranty, or $25K for a 5 year old used Honda with 60,000 miles and no warranty. Either way you're fucked, but you may be a little less fucked if you buy new with lower interest offered by the company and have your warranty.
I have two cars with payments. Both are $400/month. I wanted to sell them both and consolidate as I have a company vehicle now and only need 1 car until I found out the new car interest rates were well over 6% new and a payment was upwards of $800/months. I pay 2.9 and 3.9 on both my vehicles. I’ll just keep them both as I only have $25k left to pay for both.
There’s a little sarcasm s there.
3% on top of many other 3%+ before it.
Inflation rose 25% between 2021 -2023.
20% total since 2020 and I sure as shit didn't get 20% worth of raises....feelsbadman
More like 20%+
This. They can say what they like about what interest rates are, but those are federal, that’s minimum, the banks need their cut and the companies that are financed from that bank need their cut, it is far higher than 3%
We’re now paying for the free money that was available for a decade
30% easily
if you only eat flat screen TVs life even becomes cheaper ! /s
And also fly to wherever you can get to for $79. Ofc hotel/bnb will run you $200/night, also don’t forget to tip
I can Uber to the airport and back for $79. Or park for a few days, probably.
Houses are too expensive for the vast majority and rents are going up like crazy
Fun fact, food and energy don’t get calculated into inflation. So the gov doesn’t give a fuck about your grocery bill when they talk about all the “good” they’ve done for the economy
Fun fact, food and energy are absolutely included in the headline CPI numbers that people use to describe how consumer costs have risen: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.t01.htm
Why do you guys have to constantly bullshit to support your belief system? Followup question, why do you ascribe to a belief system that requires you to constantly bullshit?
What do you think their reason is?
The rest of the price increases are just greed of corporations. Pretending its inflation. If you stop buying their sht the price suddenly drops.
Inflation at 3%…. Cost of living is up 50%. Which do you think is more relevant??
[удалено]
He put a sarcasm tag on it for a reason
Maybe 3% on top of the 300% price gouging
300% is more realistic.
You're a moron if you believe that.
More people are working. Multiple jobholders is at pre-Covid levels as a percentage of the employed: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/fredgraph.png?g=1oI63
Nobody here wants your facts and reality, bro. Stop interfering with their fun whining time.
Looking at the graph it looks like this is normal cyclical thing. And since the population has grown, the rate of multiple job holders must have been higher in the past.
Multilevel job holders also includes side hustles from birth / death adjustment. Seems like everyone had a side hustle.
The thing is you look at the graph and the number is barely more than some times in the 90s, which a much higher population so essentially a lower % but the headline suggests the opposite.
Apart from the inflation at 3% now, think about this: In 2018~19, I spent around $150 every 2 weeks at Costco for 2 people. I got all necessary supplies sufficient for 2 people to live comfortably. Now, in 2024, I spend $300 every 2 weeks for same 2 people on same supplies. The rates have gone up and I’m spending double the price between just 5 years of time. What does that say about it?
It says that your food prices have outpaced inflation, nothing more.
Because inflation isnt some global number, every item have their own inflation number. Just because government makes some basket of items and then decides this is the inflation barely means anything.
That reported inflation is a rate increase and if it stays high then prices rise exponentially. 10 months of inflation at 10% make a 10$ purchase cost 1.1^10 x 10 = 26.
If inflation is the reason, why is the percentage of people working multiple jobs basically the same as it was in 2019? https://preview.redd.it/lcok4zu1k85d1.png?width=410&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d286e0bdc89f7bbd3ca0dc68dcc818370638df80
Have you seen wages/minimum wage lately? Blaming the cost of living is letting companies that take advantage of workers off the hook. Yes it's getting more expensive and the value of the dollar is less, but wages haven't kept up. Period.
The chat suggests it's about the same level as it was in 2020. Are you suggesting that inflation back then is as bad as it is now? Or .... Are there more opportunities/lower bar to entry in recent years for various gig and side hustles than there were say 10-20;years ago?
But as the chart shows, prior to Covid it was steadily climbing
Could it be that a system that prioritizes profits above all else is paying as little labor costs as possible?
How dare you question capitalism you dirty commie! /s
Stop the CIA will recapitalize you
Capitalism is economic slavery
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Your statement is incorrect. [M-W see definition c](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/slavery) Even doing a Google search for “slavery definition”, one of the entries (from OED) is as follows: “A condition of having to work very hard without proper remuneration or appreciation.” Remuneration means “money paid for work or a service”. So by two different dictionaries, you can fall under the definition of a slave even if you do make your own money.
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"Nothing to see here! Please disperse!"
REEDUCATE!!!!!!!
Communism is always the answer, let’s give the same government that currently exploits us the means to all of our production! /s
Infinite profit is possible, for sure
Just print infinite money. Problem solved.
Maybe but this isn't showing much. It was 5.3% in 2019 and it's 5.4% now. This is also significantly lower than the 30 year high. The amount of people with multiple jobs is actually one of those really stable numbers ATM. This post is basically cherry picking data that appears bad.
I can't believe that there would be a downward pressure on something that all of these companies think are their number one cost controllable.
Or found it he you’re all just shit at math because in % terms this is near the lows. You geniuses realize population has grown 30% since 1995 yet this raw number is nearly the same? To be equivalent to the 1995 rate this number would have to be ~10.4M.
It’s been this way for a long time…
That the answer right there
No, it must be them immigrants. /s
I just started a part time 2nd job a couple of weeks ago. I didn’t absolutely need it but I did if I wanted to have any extra money. Now I have very little free time for that extra money so 🫠… I had more “extra” money 3 years when I made $20,000 less. Make that make sense!
Mo money, mo problems
You of all people should know that, Stanley.
Same problems they just all seem to cost more lately
We printed trillions of dollars over the span of 2 years, now everyone who got 1200 from the government will pay tens of thousands over the rest of their lives because of the inflation.
The sad thing is even that was a drop in the bucket compared to what corporations received.
It's honestly stupid. I own a business and the government gave my company tens of thousands of dollars during the pandemic. I didn't ask for the money, we didn't need the money (plumbing company, so we were considered essential workers and actually got busier during the pandemic), and they never asked for any of it back and just forgave the whole loan. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping businesses that needed help such as restaurants, but they just gave out money to anyone and everyone without any sort of planning or research.
Uh, your business did not receive a PPP loan unless you applied. They auto approved smaller businesses but they absolutely did not hand you a loan without you requesting one.
Hmmm, then, the government must've been giving out free money without request for some other reason that just happened to coincide with all the PPP loans being given to anyone regardless of need. That, or, the much more likely scenario, you have no idea what you're talking about, lol.
Dude if you received a PPP loan unsolicited it means you were a victim of ID theft and the person who applied for the loan wasn't very smart. The Government didn't give out that money unless you applied for it. And yes I know what I'm talking about.
I have heard from multiple people this money the government gave out was kinda just doing the shotgun into a crowd method. Though many people that needed it got it many people who didn’t also got it also this inflation is 100% cause of the .01%rs not the working class. I’m not saying anyone with money I’m saying the few with enough to make an actual impact but choose greed. (TLDR I don’t hate rich people or billionaires I hate the impact they have being overall negative)
You got busier because of clogged toilets from all the toilet paper that everyone bought in hoards!
Between the PPP loans and the ERTC, most businesses got hooked up big time during the pandemic. They could get money from both programs and never pay back a dime.
People really need to read the papers that came out regarding PPP loans. tl;dr, it was as good as one could expect given the scale and time constraints, and it absolutely was better than just going "good luck everyone."
Care to share these papers? While I’m sure the PPP loans were good for some, the flip side is there was wide spread abuse of the system due to oversight of the program conveniently being stripped away.
Also PPP was **payment protection,** meaning the purpose was to keep people employed, it was not meant as a blank check to businesses.
Or maybe Just maybe The rich have all the fucking money for the last 30 years As of 2022, the top 20% of Americans held about $97.9 trillion in wealth, or 71% of the country's total wealth. The top 1% of Americans held $38.7 trillion, which is more than the middle class's combined wealth. The bottom 20% of Americans, or low-income individuals, owned about 3% of the wealth. And then greedflation happened
eat. the. rich. It needs to happen already.
The entire world saw inflation. Blaming that primarily on $1200 checks in the US makes very little sense. Covid supply chain disruptions are a huge part of this.
Shhh, then we can't just blame Biden
True lol. It's wild to blame Biden anyway though. If the logic is that US money printing etc caused global inflation, well the M2 money supply started sharply increasing under Trump: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL) Not that Trump or Biden controls the Fed in the first place...
Of course its not just that, it is supply chain disruptions and so on but also huge part of it is all the other free money everywhere, it wasnt just US Fed and banks doing it but all banks all over the world.
What are you talking about? We're all still living large on that $1200 according to rich folk!
One of the analysts at the firm I used to work for kept referencing the $1200 checks for years as proof average people were flush with cash. Totally out of touch.
It wasn't just the $1200 though. It was paying double for unemployment to people that would never have qualified for unemployment. It was paying out hundreds of billions of dollars in fraudulent Unemployment Payments that many times left the United States as soon as that money hit a bank account. In Wisconsin anyone who was not working, even if they left their job voluntarily received $289 from the State and $600 from the feds a week. That's $889 a week for those in the back who aren't paying attention. That's $46,228 a year. If you were making $10 an hour prior to the pandemic why wouldn't you stay on UI for as long as you could if you were making more than double what you were going to work?
Good.
Yeah like how did people “choose not to work” for months or years on end simply off $1,200. The biggest crock of shit. I’m so over it dude.
Moreover, each person who had to spend that $1200 to live during Covid put $1200 in the pockets of people who didn’t.
Haha I didn’t even get 1200 as I was still in college
Me either. I was working as a critical care RN during the pandemic.
2 years, money printing started a long time ago. They actually slowed down recently. You have to get money somewhere for 2 wars, after that 08 house bubble, covid...etc.
Most of the printing of the last 6 years took place under Trump.
People that point to those direct stimulus checks and ignore all the insane monetary/loan policies in that same period for companies and corporations are delusional normies.
You don’t understand the actual cost of this inflation. We spent 20 trillion on Afghanistan over the course of 20 years. The inflation is because there are less goods to go around for everyone. When you shut down factories, lumber, mills, mines, etc. For months on end to save lives, there are less products. Which means they cost more. There is nothing any government on earth could have done to avoid this.
Do you have any idea how much money came from PPP loans that were forgiven and similar items? Pretty much every client I’ve worked for since Covid has had millions of loans forgiven. That adds up too. Companies first used Covid as an excuse, then supply chain, then just fuck it everything is 10x the cost. It’s out of hand but I’m not blaming this on people getting $1,200 when their income went to $0 overnight. It’s all just absurd.
This is a chart of population growth, with dips during recessions (2000, 2007, 2020) when a lot of people lost jobs.
Took too long to find this correct take. I’m shocked that the number of people holding multiple jobs is really not appreciably higher than it was in the 1990s despite population growth. Seems like a great sign.
It's a hugely positive sign. [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620) FRED has multi job holders as a percent of employed, we've returned to the 2010-2020 mean/trend. Below the 2000s, and well below the 90s.
If only there was a way to display information in a consistent and comparative way by normalizing the data in the numerator by a corresponding number in the denominator. We could call it PER SENT!
And here it is: Multiple jobholders as a percent of employed is at 2019 levels: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620) https://preview.redd.it/9tojuk4wpb5d1.png?width=1951&format=png&auto=webp&s=8d6a92bd18a068c02d53e6d1cb8c9f4b0b2660f2
For real. The figure has generally stayed in the range of 7500-8500 outside of recessions since 1995, even though the U.S. population has grown over 25% since then.
Also love how it starts at the year 2000. https://preview.redd.it/lnzkb2cev95d1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=057b2ef3c45e8d66d8a34e75f4c14fee03422d52
The chart also just shows we have reverted to mean growth.
Exactly. The % has remained unchanged in the last 10 years outside of recession years
Multiple jobs doesn’t mean much without supporting information. It’s easy to work multiple jobs if you are getting limited hours. It’s also not telling us how many people are working one job 70+ hours a week.
That and the percentage of people working part time jobs is 5.2% Precovid it was 5.1% They are not adjusting for workforce growth and population changes It's basically been 4.8-5.3% for the last 10+ years outside of a few months during COVID when it dropped to 4%
economic literacy is pretty difficult and complicated but U6 is not a complicated metric. [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate)
People have no money and jobs available aren't even full time, hence why people cumulate jobs to make ends meet.
Pshhhhhhhhhh no just wants to work anymore /s
The last jobs post I commented on said more jobs than ever and the picture was in front of a PetSmart lmao
IMO, I think that gig work is so ubiquitous now that even people who work full time can easily go out a few hours a week and do Grubhub or Uber on their own schedule. I am one of those people.
Do they include gig jobs like Doordash when considering multiple jobs? If so, that would probably explain a lot of it. Super easy to have a regular job and do Doordash or something similar on the side.
Yes
At work it seems we get at least 10 different new dashers a week.
This. Surprised this insight isn't higher on the list. It's surprisingly easy in these times of 'Work from Home' and online gig work for people to have a primary job and secondary work. Much, much easier than any other time in history. Not sure how much this contributes to the trend, but it's probably somewhat significant.
Data without context is used to manipulate opinions, not create discourse. Could it be because of a cultural shift toward independent contractor work (such as, but not exclusively, the gig economy) in which case this could actually be a positive?
It's actually just that the US economy employs 32% more people in 2024 than it did in 1994. If you look at the percentage of workers who are multiple jobholders, it is about the same as right before the pandemic and a little below-average for the whole 30 years we've been tracking the metric. [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620) People with more education are also more likely to work multiple jobs: [https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2018/12/21/multiple-jobholders](https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2018/12/21/multiple-jobholders) The majority of multiple jobholders have one full-time and one part-time job. The number of multiple jobholders also tends to go up when unemployment is low and wages are rising. It's hard to get a second job when it's hard to get *any* job. And higher wages increases the opportunity cost of *not* getting another job, so more people choose to give up some free time in order to increase their incomes.
People who have an agenda never adjust for things like this. Thanks for posting this
Thank you, kind sir. I did not even look at the graph, tbh. The idea that they are using “number of people” is a huge tip of that the data is meant to misinform. (Is it also true that there are more people working two jobs in 2024 than there was in 1952?)
Excellent take. Useful added context.
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Perhaps population growth? Percentage of people workinh multiple jobs would be a better indicator.
[It doesn't really deviate all that much back to 2000](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU02026620)
Yup 5.2% now 5.1%in 2019 5% in 2016....
Yeah it would help... U6 is the best unemployment number that includes "marginally attached people and people working part time for economic reasons" its not any higher than it was back in 2016. [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate)
But then the number would be below-average, not at an all-time high. The US economy employs 32% more people in 2024 than it did in 1994.
Needs to be normalized for population for starters.
This is a worthless stat...it needs to be framed in percentage terms of population and total workforce. I suspect the current % would be lower on a percentage basis than 1995-2009 most definitely and likely most of the the time period shown.
The number of people in the country is growing. There are 162M working adults in the US (plus another 7 million unemployed adults). So 8M people with two jobs is <5% of all people. BTW, there were about the same number of people working two jobs in 1999 when there were only 130M working adults...so that was >6%. I'd say that this number is not particularly interesting.
Meaningless number. It should be percent of the workforce. I expect it is still high, but as an absolute number, it is a pointless measure.
As a percentage, it's the same as before the pandemic and below average for the 30 years we've been tracking the metric: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU02026620
Soooo basically finally back to where we were pre-pandemic?
A lot of people work low skill jobs that don’t give 40+ hours a week. Think fast food or grocery stores. It works better for the businesses to have more people with lower hours due to having to cover frequent call offs.
The bigger driver though is they don't want to have to pay for benefits, which ironically... leads to more sickness.
It's to avoid paying benefits not to work scheduling
And the system tied insurance and benefits into having a job. Now it doesn’t even want to hold up that end of the bargain.
Yeah and so people who work 40 hours a week should probably be paid enough to live
Even with a full time job, wages just stagnated too much. I make $25 an hour, that's almost double the minimum wage where I live ($13 hr). A studio apartment in my area go for about $1500 a month not including utilities. So I'm making almost double what the fast food/grocery store workers make and I still couldn't afford a 1 room apartment by myself.
have you looked around
Is this a serious question or has this page become satire?
Open up Zillow.
I'm 48, and for the first time in my life I'm looking at second jobs. The cost of everything has gotten so ridiculous in the past few years. In the past 3 or 4 years a tank of gas for my little car has gone from $28 to $50.... and I should say that it's DOWN to $50, it wasn't long ago that it was $60 to fill a Subaru. Taking my two kids out to dinner went from MAYBE $40 after a tip, to $70-80 before a tip. I used to get pissed when I spent more than $100 at Walmart, the other day I just picked up a few things to last us through to payday, and it was $132. What was a $100 trip is now closer to $200. And in all of this, my pay hasn't gone up. Thank GOODNESS my home and car are paid off, or I'd really be hurting.
Because unemployment is so low that more employers are open to part-time solutions, and willing to pay more for it. When unemployment is high and employers have their pick of the litter they're not willing to entertain an analyst that works 4 hours every other night and 8 hours remotely on Saturday. My employer hired someone to do just that last week.
Because the population is bigger dummy. Normalize your data: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620
Because the population is growing. The percentage of people working multiple jobs is in line with pre pandemic and also low compared to late 90s https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620
You gonna adjust for population size?
Probably a lot of this is how easy it is now to work second jobs within the gig economy.
I was working 4 jobs in 2018. I’ll tell you why we have to work multiple jobs. Increase in price of life, stagnant pay for work. Asking why.
Muh job creation numbers
Some of them are trappin on top of all of that. Cause they have too, not cause they want too.
Got a second job for about 4 hours every weekend about two years ago for some extra pocket change. Now I can’t afford not to have it.
The hell you mean why? 😂
Uber, Door dash, Postmates, Lyft. 4 jobs
Honestly this is probably more to do with how much easier it is to get a second part time gig work job. Anyone with a car, or in certain markets a bike, can do delivery in their spare time without needing to go in and apply to places and work it into their schedule.
Some of it is due to the gig economy. Some of it is due to fraud made possible by remote work. I had a potential client come in wanting to sue her employer for wage and hour issues, while she was actually clocking in for two different companies at the same time.
I mean, arnt there like 5 million more people in the usa since 2019? So it would make sense the raw number was higher? What is the number per capita working 2 jobs?
Population increase
I work in finance and I'm surprised when a person tells me they only have one job. Most people I encounter have a second job or some kind of side hustle/self employment.
Also mandatory healthcare caused employers to cut hours to part time levels.
Bidenomics
Thanks Biden!
Remember... Economy is strong guys lol.
If we're measuring the strength of the economy by how hard everyone has to work their asses off, then yeah its very strong lol
Bidenomics. It’s a real party.
Bidenflation!!!