#3. b. Red

Mike Norton on October 7, 2024

First: real wage growth from this same time four years ago and today. This reflects inflation adjusted wages so it includes wage growth and inflation. From October 2020 to today, real wages are down 6.3% So American’s buying power, even when offset by wage growth is significantly lower.

Now let’s talk employment. Unemployment numbers only reflect the percentage of workers in or actively looking for jobs. They do not reflect those who have given up on finding a job so they tend to under count the real unemployment number. A better metric is the percentage of the population that is employed. The percentage in Feb 2020, just prior to the COVID lockdown was 61.1% Today, the same metric is at 60.2% So, the increase in employment since COVID is primarily just a restoration of the jobs lost due to the lockdown. IN fact, there is a 1.1% drop in the percentage of the population employed which is not captured in the pure unemployment figures because they do no measure people who respond to the monthly employment surveys as actively looking for work.

What about those on fixed incomes, the most vulnerable in society. They have seen a huge attrition in the value of their savings being primarily invested in safe deposits such as bonds or money markets or savings accounts. Accounting for the 20% rise in costs over the 4 Biden years, the average fixed saver, lost 12% of the value of their savings. Inflation rose 20% over the Biden years compared to 8 % iver tge sane 4 years under Trump.

:Let’s take a look at some real apples to apples comparison.

As for young Americans, the average mortgage payment rose from $1100 in 2020 to $2200 in 2024 making the American dream a nightmare for young couples and families. The cost of a college education rose from

It’s obvious why Americans feel worse off. The last four years economically are the worst experienced since Carter was President. While Biden brags on his economic accomplishments, the truth is his only success is the restoration of most, but not all of the jobs lost in the COVID lockdown.

All of the above statistics are derived from Federal reporting and are publicly available