How are you feeling?
“How ya’ doing?” We hear that often in our lives. Most times we give a stock answer: “Fine.” “Good.” “O.K.”
Or maybe that’s just men:)
Perhaps with our closest friends or family we actually answer the question honestly: “My back is killing me today.” “My kids are driving me crazy.” “I hate my job.” “I’m really bummed out because of that argument that I had with my spouse last night.”
In politics, the “how are you feeling?” question is usually focused on your views about the economy and/or the direction of the country. And let’s be honest: many people have concerns.
We are surrounded by chaos, it seems. There are two major wars, criminal and civil trials of a former president, constant weather challenges, mass shootings, elected officials’ reluctance to agree on true immigration policy changes/border enforcement, cultural issue arguments, plus the longstanding problems of poverty, health system inequality, homelessness, addiction, mental illness and shrinking small town communities.
A LOT.
The economic side of this in particular intrigues me. “How are you feeling about the economy?”
We have been through so much since 2020. A LOT. COVID-19 upended our lives.
History may show that masks and vaccines didn’t prevent the virus’ spread as much as optimists had hoped (although, everything that I’ve seen shows that both offered a greater potential of protection to prevent or reduce the effects).
Congress, under the Trump and Biden administrations, may have spent too much in trying to prevent the United States from plummeting into another Great Recession — or worse — as the virus began ravaging our communities (administrations may have tried to get aid money into people’s hands as soon as they could, rather than taking more time and determining which families, businesses, local governments and organizations needed it to stay economically viable).
Governors shut down schools and certain businesses. Millions of workers got sick. Thousands died. Thousands more never returned to the workforce. Supply chains choked.
Inflation soared.
Interest rates remain the highest they have been in about 20 years. That may weigh heavily on your mind if you want to buy a house, property, vehicle or some other major purchases.
A LOT.
Inflation has slowed down. Although, it only means that the cost of goods isn’t rising as fast as it was in 2021 and early 2022. It doesn’t mean —with some exceptions — that things are getting cheaper.
However…
Wage increases have outpaced the rise in inflation for more than a year. That helps families get ahead again (as long as they didn’t fall too far behind earlier). Unemployment is nearing a 60-year low. Gas prices are way down. Even the average Thanksgiving meal is cheaper. In this case, that means prices went down, not just that prices didn’t increase as much as they usually do. They went down. Enjoy that Thanksgiving bird.
We avoided recession. Remember before the 2022 election when some politicians (Republicans were the only ones saying this from what I recall) that we were in recession already? Economists say we weren’t. And we still aren’t.
The negatives outweigh the positives for most people. The New York Times and Siena College poll in key swing states earlier this month found that 81% of respondents felt like the economy was poor or fair. That’s not good for President Joe Biden.
Let’s see how people feel a year from now. Let’s see if the economy has continued to improve or if those high interest rates end up slowing down growth too much. If people still feel like they aren’t getting ahead, they may be more inclined to vote for the Republican presidential nominee.
If Biden is the nominee for Democrats…and voters feel better about the economy…that might better his chances. But maybe a better indication will be how those voters are feeling overall, not just how they feel about the economy.
So how are you feeling?
SOME OTHER THINGS….
Here is something that I did on TV: We got the behind-the-scenes’ account of how a meeting of about three dozen frustrated Iowans led to a public showing of support for Republican presidential candidate Nikki Hailey.
And the Family Leader held a unique presidential forum where three candidates sat down at a Thanksgiving-themed table to talk in-depth about their faith, family and future. One thing that we noticed was that all three candidates discussed challenges in trying to start a family.
Finally, I learned how one farming couple changed crops to help with a water shortage.
Read my American Farmland Owner story on that here.
Thanks a lot for reading and thanks for your support!
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It feels like most of us in Central Iowa are either somewhat confident in the economy and life in general - but when we gather with friends, the conversation is typically about how we really don't know what's going on, how many fresh obstacles our kids face, and how we feel bad...about feeling bad about things here in the amazing USA. I've never been more confused Dave. I'll send you an email with a link to an article I just published about this topic and how I'm going to go about dealing with it. Hope all is well.
I can well remember interest rates on savings much higher than what they currently are and it made it easier to save money as a result! Now everybody wants cheap interest rates so they can spend money, no one wants to save! I am pretty well fixed these days, I'm 73 and went through plenty of struggles getting here, but made it through long periods of unemployment, a divorce, and other upsets in my life and times, but I struggled to overcome these adversities, by doing things others wouldn't even lower themselves to do, and still won't. I was so poor at one period that every dime I made was going to someone besides me, and at the end of the day my meal for the evening would consist of whatever I could get from the soda cans I recycled! I haven't stopped! Over the last three years I have rescued over $2,200 worth of bottles and cans from a single dumpster at the end of a canoe take out! A period of about three to four months. I save the drinking water to water my plants and whatever food stuffs and snack food I find to feed my brother-in-laws chickens. Now, this year I am exrtending my dumpster diving and working on an apartment dumpster behind my house. There are plenty of people with kids that have little money, but you coldn't tell it from the stuff they throw away! I pull over 100 to 125 cans and bottles out of that dumpster every week, most of it soda cans. I still find snack food for chickens, but I have also found cookware, books, gloves, and all sorts of material someone else could use if they only made it available to others rather than toss it in the garbage. It really would make sense if people would be responsible enough to not be so wasteful and think about what they are doing that simply is wasting resources! For two years I kept telling people not to ditch their water in the land fill, pour it back into narture where it can return to the water supply,! The usual response was "Huh"???? I finally gve up and started saving the bottles of water being tossed by pouring the partials together in gallon jugs and taking it home to water plants and fruit trees in this dry Iowa weather. It may only be a small thing that I'm doing, but it satisfies me to tell others about how much I make doing it, which surprises them. So if you ask me how I'm feeling, my response would be "A lot richer because of wasteful people!"