NY Times Says Coming Economic Pain Is Going To Hurt

The economy is pretty much the first thing on everyone’s mind, right? In the mind’s of the Trump Deranged Media, it’s January 6, which are the top 5 stories on the NY Times webpage this morning. Then a big block of Ukraine stories. Then, finally,

This Is Going to Hurt

Kat Johnston didn’t expect the pandemic to make her less stressed about her finances. After all, she temporarily lost her job at the library where she worked full time. But, like many Americans, she found an unexpected reprieve from money worries: Months at home limited her spending, and she received expanded unemployment insurance and two one-time checks from the government.

“When I first came back to work, I had probably $2,200 in savings — which I know is not much, but it’s more than I’d had in a while,” she said. But it was no match for the inflation that has come since. “That savings is pretty much gone now. As things have gotten so expensive, it’s been almost a paycheck-to-paycheck life.” (snip)

Millions of Americans are feeling similarly stuck as their savings run low and their cost of living runs high. Now, the economy appears poised to slow — potentially sharply — in ways that could limit wage growth and cause job losses even as prices remain elevated. But instead of rushing to the economy’s aid by giving Americans money, as they did in March 2020, policymakers are engineering this slowdown. Then, the problem was a global pandemic; now, it’s stubbornly high inflation, and the main way the government knows to solve that is by inflicting some economic pain.

In other words, the long-predicted “cliff” may finally have arrived.

Giving out tons and tons of money is part of the reason why inflation is worse in the US than in other 1st World nations. Money that really wasn’t necessary in 2021, and money that wasn’t tracked.

When the first round of pandemic aid programs began to expire in the summer of 2020, economists warned of a looming cliff facing both Americans who still needed government help and the pandemic-addled economy that was not yet ready to stand on its own. They repeated those warnings last fall, when Congress allowed unemployment benefits to expire for millions of workers, and again in January, when monthly payments for families with children came to an end.

The loss of those programs and others, including enhanced nutrition benefits, was painful for many families. But for the economy as a whole, the cliffs turned out to be more like potholes. Consumers kept on spending, in part because trillions in government aid had allowed many Americans to build up at least a small financial buffer — as Ms. Johnston did — and in part because a record-setting recovery in the job market gave workers an income boost that helped offset the loss in government aid.

Recovery is a good word: these aren’t new jobs, they’re jobs being re-filled after being cut. I know my business, and many others, have not filled the roughly 3rd that were created by people leaving.

Pay gains have been falling behind inflation for monthsCredit card balances, which fell early in the pandemic, are rising toward a record high. Subprime borrowers — those with weak credit scores — are increasingly falling behind on payments on car loans in particular, credit bureau data show. Measures of hunger are rising, even with unemployment still low and the overall economy still strong.

And what has Biden been doing? Not much of anything, except trying to get his bills, like Build Back Better, passed, which would make inflation even worse. The Times spends a lot more time describing the pain Americans are feeling and are going to feel, and through the whole thing they mention Biden’s name just once, way, way deep

Republicans, meanwhile, have blamed the Biden administration — and in particular, the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan that Democrats passed early last year — for making inflation worse. Many economists, among them Democrats, agree that the spending did drive at least some of the inflation, making the politics of economic aid even more fraught.

And what’s Biden doing? Why, he’s going to the beach in Delaware late this morning. He’s not even waiting till the afternoon, planning on leaving at 11:55am.

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7 Responses to “NY Times Says Coming Economic Pain Is Going To Hurt”

  1. H says:

    Teach wefe tge huge deficits posted on all 4 years in anyway a contributing factor to our inflation.
    Do you feel that Biden is responsible to the current similar inflation in the other developed countries? Should they also be blaming Biden for somehow not building any additional refineries in the 15 months he has been POTUS?
    Do you think that another refinery if it magically appeared in the USA would somehow effect the worldwide price of gasine?

    • alanstorm says:

      Just as incoherent and uninformed as always, Hairy.

      Nice to know you are consistent.

  2. The Liberal but not libertarian Elwood P. Dowd says:

    Trump signed more spending than did President Biden.

    Trump grossly mishandled the pandemic, but not as bad as he wanted, thank Allah.

    But the team in power pays the price for a troubled economy, regardless of cause.

    Obama won in 2008 because of the Great Recession.

    • alanstorm says:

      Trump grossly mishandled the pandemic, but not as bad as he wanted, thank Allah.

      How? The only thing he did wrong was to not fire Fauci.

      It wasn’t him shutting down states’ economies and instituting damaging and ineffective mask mandates and lockdowns.

      The one thing he could and did do – namely, restricting travel from outside the country – got him called racist.

      We realize you’re kinda slow, but it’s nice of you to confirm it every so often.

    • James Lewis says:

      Dear Elwood:

      The press lies. And lies. And distorts. Almost all are in the Democrat’s destroy America and Trump machine. Now they claimed it he played the pandemic down.

      Of course, he played it down.

      Leaders don’t yell fire in a crowded theater. Panic is never good.

      At the same time, he was

      organizing a response team of scientists and doctors;

      shutting down travel into to the country from China by non US citizens;

      meeting with the 50 governors on a daily basis to see what they needed;

      meeting with our manufacturers to get them started on producing ventilators, masks and other PPE equipment;

      encouraging our pharmacy corporations to develop a vaccine and medicines;

      establishing a plan to distribute the vaccine nationwide immediately when available;

      moving US Navy hospital ships to NYC and SF as backups;

      having the US Corp of Engineers build emergency hospitals;

      noting that Hydroxychloroquine was showing good results for some;

      all while informing the US people of the status of things on a daily basis.

      And all of this started while the number of confirmed cases in the US was less very low.

      Other than that, he was pretty well doing nothing. (sarcasm alert)

      Of course, Fauci was telling us we didn’t need masks they wouldn’t work, just shut the country down. He then changed his mind when the low death rates in Japan and other mask wearing countries was pointed out.

      In the meantime, Slow Joe Biden, and other Democrats were calling him a racist for shutting down travel from China.

      And Fancy Nancy and Crazy de Blasio was encouraging people to partying on down for the Chinese New Year celebrations. That spread the disease nationwide.

      Killer Cuomo and other Democrat governors were killing nursing home patients.

      You didn’t know this?

      What have you been doing? Watching CNN??????

  3. The distinguished Mr Dowd wants to blame Donald Trump for everything, but with a year-over-year inflation rate of 8.6% in May, and an earnings increase of 4.33%, most people are going to be worried about what is happening now, not what happened under President Trump.

    Odds are that we will officially be in a recession when the second quarter numbers come out, and yes, we will tie that word around Joe Biden’s and the Democrats’ scrawny necks come November, just as you would do to President Trump and the Republicans if they had won the 2020 elections. You guys will try to campaign on the Capitol kerfuffle, and letting men males into girls bathrooms and locker rooms while working Americans are getting poorer each month.

    • Elwood P. Dowd says:

      Politics ain’t beanbag.

      Of course GOPhers will attack the Dems over the economy. It would be political malpractice otherwise. And yes, if trump had managed to steal the election the Dems would have crucified him for inflation.

      And of course DonJon trump is responsible for the crippling pandemic as he was president. That’s one reason he lost the election so convincingly.

      Politics is all lies and emotion and money.

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