Okay, call me an outlier, but I’m a Harris voter who thinks the country is going in the wrong direction. That’s WHY I’m a Harris voter.
Of course the economy is the envy of the world, crime is down, drug deaths have started declining. But Republicans have virtually paralyzed Congress. Almost nothing legislative that needs to be done and could be done is getting done.
In the end, asking whether the country is going in the right direction is simply too broad a question to generate a meaningful response.
I would pile on this to add some other reasons to think that the (primarily economic) metrics Dan cites are only a partial snapshot of factors that make Americans feel good about their lives and the government's role in it.
Well I appreciate the significant decline in opioid overdoses being mentioned, there still remains a social crisis. Social ties have frayed across the board, and Americans feel a distinct lack of community. Trust in institutions and their fellow Americans is incredibly low. These sociological factors are arguably just as important as the ones Dan cites for fostering a purposeful, meaningful existence.
I do want to raise a point that I have raised elsewhere, though. I'm not sure how much stock we should place in "right track/wrong track" polling questions. If I were asked this, I might well think first about the dominance of the MAGAt point of view, the rise in militant Christian Nationalism, the fact that Trump, ffs, is still a coin toss away from getting reelected, and one of the two major parties has lost all spine and moral compass. So, I might well say "wrong track." I suspect I'm not alone in this.
I should add that I completely buy the statistical picture that you presented -- of course I think most things are going pretty well in the US. My only point here was about the ambiguity of that one poll question.
I agree and feel the things that are getting better. I wonder how much of the public sentiment is connected with news organizations, such as FOX and any other that wants to keep us engaged, that keep telling us how horrible things are. I mean, if you live in a relatively safe place, but the news keeps telling you that there are really unsafe places out there, then you might still think things are pretty bad out there.
This is really interesting, but it would be even more interesting if it explored why there's such a widespread feeling that things aren't getting better - for example, even though the rate of inflation has dropped, prices aren't going to go back to their pre-COVID levels, so unless people's wages/incomes have increased to match (which for many people is definitely not the case) then it's not surprising they're feeling left behind. Add in wealth inequality, corporate price gouging and the rural/urban divide, and it's actually no wonder there's such a stark divide between the macroeconomic indicators you're referring to in this article, and people's perception of the direction the country is heading in.
Dan - I believe you! I think this is an excellent summary of that thing called "reality" well presented. I intend to forward it to a couple friends. I would be really curious to hear how you explain why 2/3 of the public seem convinced things are just bad?
The CBO put a report out earlier this year that might answer this.
From Judd Legum @ Popular Information:
“The report focuses on the American economy from 2019 to 2021. That period included a massive economic disruption due to the pandemic and a recovery as the economy reopened.
The report reveals that the economic impact of the pandemic was concentrated among the bottom 20% of earners. That group saw a significant decrease in labor income in 2020, which did not rebound as the economy reopened in 2021. The middle 60% of earners largely treaded water between 2019 and 2021 with little change to labor income or realized capital gains (which is the income generated from the sale of stock or other investments). Over the same three years, however, the top 20% of earners saw increased labor income and a dramatic increase in realized capital gains. “
It goes on from there, but the gist is that Covid broke things…And in the process, broke people’s brains. Then, when you add the nonstop propaganda about the terrible state of the economy and how crime is rampant in US cities from certain corners of media, social media and an entire political party and you’ve got a toxic soup of “everything is just horrible”.
That isn't "data". That article's about polls and opinions. Let's talk numbers and facts. "The past 16 months of “real” wage growth — as economists have called it — haven’t been enough to offset the 25 months where prices were rising disproportionately faster than Americans’ paychecks" https://www.bankrate.com/banking/federal-reserve/wage-to-inflation-index/
Add to this the fact that the top 1/3 skews the numbers upward (high income earners are doing exceptionally well, thank you) and you have an even bleaker picture for the middle income and below worker.
"In other words, there is a plausible scenario whereby, four years from now, Trump will claim 2025 as the moment in which the United States fully absorbed the myriad shocks of the last fifteen years and moved forward, and it was all due to him..."
As he did with the economic momentum he inherited from the Obama administration, who had to pick up the pieces after the GFC in 2008, as did Biden after Covid in 2020.
This post is the reason I am unsubscribing. And I was a paying subscriber too.
The economy might be doing fine, but the people are not, and to say that they are categorically wrong for feeling like things aren’t good, especially in light of the election results, is just the most elitist possible.
Let the Stephen Pinkers of the world peddle this kind of garbage. Like, you’re a political scientist. wtf was this.
Wealthy people have a hard time understanding that when housing and food cost far more than many people make, it doesn’t matter what the “data says.” People are not going to be happy. I notice who keeps asking why people aren’t thrilled with the economy when stock market is so good.
We. don’t. have. stocks! The stock market seems immaterial to a lot of people. It’s a simple answer to a question people who are out of touch with ordinary people have been asking for years now. Guess that sentiment doesn’t come through in the data.
Yes and very accurate. As for data, data is just facts. It is a fact the bottom 2/3 have yet to overcome inflation. This may or may not determine voting preference. Regardless, that doesn't make it less of a fact.
If the economy keeps getting better the US is not going to have enough workers to do the work. MAGA wants to kick 11million out on top of the native born birthrate below replacement. Rock meet Hard Place!!!
I will read but I had to stop at the reference to whether the country is headed in the right direction. This question is so misleading. Of course the country is not headed in the right direction when Donald Trump is a political force. It has nothing to do with inflation or whatever. Please take that question out of all polls pronto.
The business model for cable news networks is built on peddling outrage and despair. If they were to promote these good news stories, their business model would collapse. So the news networks will continue to foster outrage about the sorry state of America, contrary to the positive trends that Dr. Drezner mentioned in the article. Never let the facts get in the way of a good story.
Despite the reported murder statistics, we also have the recent Commonwealth Fund report:
"With far more people dying of gun-related causes annually in the United States than in other high-income countries, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, M.D., officially declared firearm violence a public health crisis on June 25, 2024. In his advisory, Murthy noted that over half of U.S. adults have either experienced gun-related violence themselves or have a family member who has. Firearms are the leading cause of death for children in the U.S. and are the weapons used most often in domestic violence against women."
Informative and useful aggregation of key indicators. That said, federalism (e.g., the effects of Dobbs on women's quality of life, safety, and health) leads me to believe that all the positives you cite are unevenly distributed.
Okay, call me an outlier, but I’m a Harris voter who thinks the country is going in the wrong direction. That’s WHY I’m a Harris voter.
Of course the economy is the envy of the world, crime is down, drug deaths have started declining. But Republicans have virtually paralyzed Congress. Almost nothing legislative that needs to be done and could be done is getting done.
In the end, asking whether the country is going in the right direction is simply too broad a question to generate a meaningful response.
Did not see your comment until after I posted mine. Glad to see I'm not the only one with this concern.
I would pile on this to add some other reasons to think that the (primarily economic) metrics Dan cites are only a partial snapshot of factors that make Americans feel good about their lives and the government's role in it.
Well I appreciate the significant decline in opioid overdoses being mentioned, there still remains a social crisis. Social ties have frayed across the board, and Americans feel a distinct lack of community. Trust in institutions and their fellow Americans is incredibly low. These sociological factors are arguably just as important as the ones Dan cites for fostering a purposeful, meaningful existence.
Thanks for the boost!
I do want to raise a point that I have raised elsewhere, though. I'm not sure how much stock we should place in "right track/wrong track" polling questions. If I were asked this, I might well think first about the dominance of the MAGAt point of view, the rise in militant Christian Nationalism, the fact that Trump, ffs, is still a coin toss away from getting reelected, and one of the two major parties has lost all spine and moral compass. So, I might well say "wrong track." I suspect I'm not alone in this.
I should add that I completely buy the statistical picture that you presented -- of course I think most things are going pretty well in the US. My only point here was about the ambiguity of that one poll question.
The American people are unimpressed with the facts, because they are unaware of them.
I agree and feel the things that are getting better. I wonder how much of the public sentiment is connected with news organizations, such as FOX and any other that wants to keep us engaged, that keep telling us how horrible things are. I mean, if you live in a relatively safe place, but the news keeps telling you that there are really unsafe places out there, then you might still think things are pretty bad out there.
This is really interesting, but it would be even more interesting if it explored why there's such a widespread feeling that things aren't getting better - for example, even though the rate of inflation has dropped, prices aren't going to go back to their pre-COVID levels, so unless people's wages/incomes have increased to match (which for many people is definitely not the case) then it's not surprising they're feeling left behind. Add in wealth inequality, corporate price gouging and the rural/urban divide, and it's actually no wonder there's such a stark divide between the macroeconomic indicators you're referring to in this article, and people's perception of the direction the country is heading in.
Are we measuring what we value, or are you trying to persuade me to value what you can measure?
Dan - I believe you! I think this is an excellent summary of that thing called "reality" well presented. I intend to forward it to a couple friends. I would be really curious to hear how you explain why 2/3 of the public seem convinced things are just bad?
The CBO put a report out earlier this year that might answer this.
From Judd Legum @ Popular Information:
“The report focuses on the American economy from 2019 to 2021. That period included a massive economic disruption due to the pandemic and a recovery as the economy reopened.
The report reveals that the economic impact of the pandemic was concentrated among the bottom 20% of earners. That group saw a significant decrease in labor income in 2020, which did not rebound as the economy reopened in 2021. The middle 60% of earners largely treaded water between 2019 and 2021 with little change to labor income or realized capital gains (which is the income generated from the sale of stock or other investments). Over the same three years, however, the top 20% of earners saw increased labor income and a dramatic increase in realized capital gains. “
It goes on from there, but the gist is that Covid broke things…And in the process, broke people’s brains. Then, when you add the nonstop propaganda about the terrible state of the economy and how crime is rampant in US cities from certain corners of media, social media and an entire political party and you’ve got a toxic soup of “everything is just horrible”.
https://popular.info/p/a-new-government-report-reveals-the?
This sounds accurate. Thanks for sharing.
For 2/3's of Americans, inflation has increased their debt and lowered their standard of living.
Once again you have confused your own opinion with, you know, actual data. You keep trying though! https://fortune.com/2024/05/30/economy-personal-finance-consumer-confidence-inflation-unemployment-jobs/
That isn't "data". That article's about polls and opinions. Let's talk numbers and facts. "The past 16 months of “real” wage growth — as economists have called it — haven’t been enough to offset the 25 months where prices were rising disproportionately faster than Americans’ paychecks" https://www.bankrate.com/banking/federal-reserve/wage-to-inflation-index/
Add to this the fact that the top 1/3 skews the numbers upward (high income earners are doing exceptionally well, thank you) and you have an even bleaker picture for the middle income and below worker.
Real GDP per capita
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1yLsj
Real disposable personal income per capita
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1yLtj
Both solidly better than pre pandemic levels.
Thanks. I would only, again, point to that upper third, which skews the data upward.
"In other words, there is a plausible scenario whereby, four years from now, Trump will claim 2025 as the moment in which the United States fully absorbed the myriad shocks of the last fifteen years and moved forward, and it was all due to him..."
As he did with the economic momentum he inherited from the Obama administration, who had to pick up the pieces after the GFC in 2008, as did Biden after Covid in 2020.
This post is the reason I am unsubscribing. And I was a paying subscriber too.
The economy might be doing fine, but the people are not, and to say that they are categorically wrong for feeling like things aren’t good, especially in light of the election results, is just the most elitist possible.
Let the Stephen Pinkers of the world peddle this kind of garbage. Like, you’re a political scientist. wtf was this.
Wealthy people have a hard time understanding that when housing and food cost far more than many people make, it doesn’t matter what the “data says.” People are not going to be happy. I notice who keeps asking why people aren’t thrilled with the economy when stock market is so good.
We. don’t. have. stocks! The stock market seems immaterial to a lot of people. It’s a simple answer to a question people who are out of touch with ordinary people have been asking for years now. Guess that sentiment doesn’t come through in the data.
Yes and very accurate. As for data, data is just facts. It is a fact the bottom 2/3 have yet to overcome inflation. This may or may not determine voting preference. Regardless, that doesn't make it less of a fact.
If the economy keeps getting better the US is not going to have enough workers to do the work. MAGA wants to kick 11million out on top of the native born birthrate below replacement. Rock meet Hard Place!!!
I believe I heard that people think they themselves are doing well, but that the economy overall is not. Could this be the impact of Fox News?
I will read but I had to stop at the reference to whether the country is headed in the right direction. This question is so misleading. Of course the country is not headed in the right direction when Donald Trump is a political force. It has nothing to do with inflation or whatever. Please take that question out of all polls pronto.
The business model for cable news networks is built on peddling outrage and despair. If they were to promote these good news stories, their business model would collapse. So the news networks will continue to foster outrage about the sorry state of America, contrary to the positive trends that Dr. Drezner mentioned in the article. Never let the facts get in the way of a good story.
Despite the reported murder statistics, we also have the recent Commonwealth Fund report:
"With far more people dying of gun-related causes annually in the United States than in other high-income countries, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, M.D., officially declared firearm violence a public health crisis on June 25, 2024. In his advisory, Murthy noted that over half of U.S. adults have either experienced gun-related violence themselves or have a family member who has. Firearms are the leading cause of death for children in the U.S. and are the weapons used most often in domestic violence against women."
Informative and useful aggregation of key indicators. That said, federalism (e.g., the effects of Dobbs on women's quality of life, safety, and health) leads me to believe that all the positives you cite are unevenly distributed.