Rates are crashing and fuel to the moon!

I know its not politically correct but they are lots of “new visitors” in the last few years and they aint going “home”. They have to live somewhere and survive….

 

I don't have the answer or solution.
I do know that we here in the twin cities used to have 24 hour grocery stores, Walmarts and restaurants but nowadays can't find anything open after 11.
Even White Castle, the last bastion for drunken sots to chow closes at midnight..lol

 

I suspect it's just a labor issue. I've had ads out for farm labor at $20 an hour for three months, and no response. I interviewed a guy for a farm manager position and his number was $38 per hour plus housing. Meanwhile bank loan officers are making $23 an hour and thinking they are hot stuff.

At those hourly rates, you've got to sling a lot of burgers to make a bottom line.

 

Could be I guess but just a few yrs ago we had the manpower to staff those jobs at a lesser wage but when costs were much cheaper.
I won't comment on the modern workforce.

 

There are a lot on non-sequiturs in today's economy. Wage earners are struggling, but large corporations are posting solid profits and engaging in stock buy backs. By all traditional metrics, the US economy is doing great and the global economy is doing just fine. On the other hand, there are a lot of recession signals being posted - as they have been since late 2018/early 2019. The DOW and Nasdaq are flush with cash while the Russell 2000 and consumer debt are at concerning levels. The recent hit in the Nikkei was quickly absorbed by all the cash sitting on the sidelines.

For every positive sign there is a negative and vice versa. The big problem is the amount of wealth concentration - not just in individuals but more importantly in corporations. The mergers/acquisitions market has been very active over the last 15 years - up to 60% of grocery sales are concentrated into 5 companies. Blackrock, Vanguard and State Street control 70% of the ETF market. They are more concerned about short term profits than long term profitability. All of this produces downward pressure on wages and a lack on investment into future growth.

You said "a good economy is when everybody does well". I agree. The reality is that those of us who have are doing well and will do better while those who don't have will grind themselves to death with no appreciable gain. My company's 2nd quarter results stated "As of June 30, 2024, year to date free cash flow increased $93.5 million compared to the same period in 2023" - basically while gross profits are lower than the pandemic driven highs, costs have dropped faster than revenue. Executive suite and VPs got raises this year, office critters got a 1% raise but a significant cut to profit based bonuses which is an overall pay cut, while drivers and mechanics got nothing. This trend will continue because that's how the system is set up.

 

We got a significant raise in March probably more than we deserved and we probably make more than 90 to 95% of the other drivers out there I'm not complaining I'm just observing what I will tell you is about your stock market and cash Holdings of large corporations my stock has returned over 5,000% in 15 years I'm up over 1 million on my purchases I'm not going to complain.
I think the gap between the Haves and The Haves Nots is widening

 

And that is a problem. When there is a great disparity in wealth one of two things happen - a police state or revolution.

We can blame avocado toast and mocha lattes all we want, but the income disparities are baked into the system. When even those who are doing everything "right" financially don't feel like they're keeping their head above water, bad things are going to happen.

 

This is the precisely the rights battle cry..
"Are you better off now than 4 years ago"

In 50 yrs I wanted to buy my own rig 4 times.
Once when I just started out. We were coming out of a recession, the war was ending and we had a truckers strike.
Same as the 80s..another recession.
Again in the 90s and right after the last one in 2007- 2010.
Each time when I put pen to paper the numbers didn't add up for me to abandon my chush job.
There is no way I could convince my self to try it in today's market.
Ever since I started trucking the rule of thumb, told to me by a buddy's dad who leased to International Transport back in the day, was you had to make per mile what a gallon of diesel cost to make a decent living. He paid a truck note, a mortgage etc while his wife stayed home and raised the kids and paid for college after high school.
Don't know how many can do that in today's economy.

 

20 dollars an hour doesn’t buy jack #### anymore. My wife makes 23. She brings home around 1200-1300 every two weeks. You can’t survive on 600 a week anymore. Inflation is strangling this economy.

 

I made that argument during dinner with the in-laws last night. @gentleroger made the argument of wealth disparity, focusing on the haves and the have nots.

If you look, an actual majority of gains in the stock market was in 7 stocks, all tech. Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon, Nvidia, etc. Only one, Amazon, uses trucks to deliver their product. Second, that wealth gain is highly concentrated in the major cities, many on the west coast. Microsoft and Amazon in Seattle, San Francisco, you know the names. Companies that do well pay higher wages and more bonuses and stock option. That wealth disparity is very highly concentrated in those big cities (and our elections reflect it). Nobody wonders how an issue "plays in Peoria" anymore. Peoria doesn't come up in anyone's thinking, not anymore.

Enter the Covidiocy, and enough of that wealth spread into other states as people retired or started working remote and moved out of the urban infestations they tolerated as long as they neoeded t. In turn, that drove real estate prices into the stratosphere -- and rent or mortgage is about 30% of the average budget. Where I used to be able to rent a cheap rental for an employee for $5-600, it's more than double that now. If an employee pays $1,500 a month in rent, that's $9 an hour just to cover that. As you mention, makes $20 an hour pretty much impossible to survive as a single income family.