Why do so many families seem to live paycheck to paycheck if the economy is so good?

[bongsaway]

Why do so many families seem to live paycheck to paycheck if the economy is so good?

Do we tend to look at the health of 'the economy' through the eyes of the stock market and employment percentages? Or is the health of the economy people living paycheck to paycheck with little room for even a small disaster to their family?

 

[Rogue Valley]

Why do so many families seem to live paycheck to paycheck if the economy is so good?

Do we tend to look at the health of 'the economy' through the eyes of the stock market and employment percentages? Or is the health of the economy people living paycheck to paycheck with little room for even a small disaster to their family?

Trump's 2018-tax-reform-trickle-down-economy doesn't improve life for most Americans. Plus, his tariff wars are hurting the manufacturing and agriculture sectors.

 

[OrphanSlug]

Why do so many families seem to live paycheck to paycheck if the economy is so good?

Do we tend to look at the health of 'the economy' through the eyes of the stock market and employment percentages? Or is the health of the economy people living paycheck to paycheck with little room for even a small disaster to their family?

Because our economic model can best be summed up as oligarchic capitalism.

The economy being "so good" has nothing to do with economic security for the 2nd income quintile down to the bottom 5th, it has to do with how well the top income earners are doing at enslaving the rest of us to their wealth accumulation methods.

And it drives home the point that no matter how well the economy is doing, there is no such thing as trickle down economics.

Every measure of the economy across all the income quintiles supports my position. Wage growth per income quintile on a trend line, wage growth to inflation, share of income per income quintile, distribution of wealth held per income quintile, debt across all the economy, you name it.

 

[dirtpoorchris]

Because banks and real estate agents love our current atmosphere and for some reason there are no tradeskill colleges pumping out house builders. We need to start paying the Amish to make these colleges or make some new ez pour concrete automated housing. No human should have to pay rent to a landlord. Its barbaric. (unless its a REALLY REALLY REALLY nice facility and you are paying for the extra perks)

 

[Mycroft]

Why do so many families seem to live paycheck to paycheck if the economy is so good?

Poor money management and excessive personal spending.

Do we tend to look at the health of 'the economy' through the eyes of the stock market and employment percentages? Or is the health of the economy people living paycheck to paycheck with little room for even a small disaster to their family?

How people live (paycheck to paycheck, in this case) is irrelevant to the health of the economy.

 

[RabidAlpaca]

One of the major talking points the right used during Obama's tenure was that all the job growth was actually low quality, low paying jobs, and basically they were right. Over the past decades jobs that used to feed a family of 4 became jobs that one needed to work two of to even make ends meet. Nothing has changed, the problem is the same, if not worse than it ever was. The fact that we're near full employment does not mean that those are quality jobs. Many millions of Americans are struggling, and they're largely being ignored.