Biden rips media for economy coverage: ‘Start reporting it the right way’
Biden rips media for economy coverage: ‘Start reporting it the right way’
thehill.com
Biden rips media for economy coverage: ‘Start reporting it the right way’
188 comments
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Yeah, even as a solid dem from my perspective this reads as “report how I want it to sound”. It falls flat.
That said; the economy is doing better (but unfortunately the kind of economic improvement that helps shareholders more than regular people), inflation slowed down, unionization is on the rise, fuel prices (temporarily, as always) are down…so that’s good.
But housing or every kind is still out of control. Record profits without commensurately rising wages. New cars are still fucking ridiculous money. We’re being subscribed to death.
So from an everyday perspective we are still getting fucked.
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There's not much Biden can do about late stage capitalism. We're reaching the end game. Where companies take us for just nearly everything we have to where we "survive" enough to keep working and paying them but just barely.
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Even just talking about it truthfully would be something. Sticking his head in the ground is just going to get us a dictator.
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unionization is on the rise
How is this good, exactly? What problems need fixing in the US that unions are well poised to fix?
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Low wages, poor or high cost benefits, termination for any reason the employer sees fit… unions can also fill in gaps with additional insurance, legal benefits, addiction programs, and more.
Are you not from the US?
E: quick trip thru your comment history shows possibly Finnish? With libertarian and possibly anarchist leanings. Pro-free market to a fault while completely ignoring the damage free markets do, and the fact that they’re never really free.
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Pandemic-disrupted supply chains are pretty much righted. Inflation is already back near normal levels. Labor shortages have eased. The Federal Reserve is poised to cut interest rates next year.
We'll still get a thousand stories about a looming recession.
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Inflation is back near normal, but prices are not, and wages have not shifted to match those prices (partially due to the government fighting "wage inflation"). People are still worse off than they used to be. I don't think this is Biden's fault, but here we are anyway.
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Biden has called this out. A lot of companies are still raising prices or aren't letting prices fall. They're still saying "oh, this is inflation causing this" while their costs fall and their profits rise.
Biden can't stop them singlehandedly. (He's a President, not a Supreme Dictator.) But he can call them out on it and use what powers he has to bear down on them somewhat if they don't stop.
It might not get all of them to stop (some might risk fines because the profits would be greater), but hopefully it will direct the anger towards the actual culprits - big companies taking advantage of past inflation to raise prices.
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People are looking at inflation dropping, thinking that's an immediate fix. They're forgetting that inflation is a measure of velocity. The ground that prices gained isn't being eaten back up unless inflation goes to an effective negative compared to income.
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Deflation is bad. I promise you do not want what you are suggesting is required.
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That's not why people are feeling pessimistic. Too much of the economic recovery is going to corporate profits and capitalist shareholders. The federal minimum wage is still half of a poverty wage, and the rent is still too damn high. The hyperinflation of the pandemic has made working for a living unsustainable. Taking inflation from 9% to 3% is great (setting aside for this conversation that any President shouldn't really take credit for economic matters) but it's reduce the rate at which a bad thing is getting worse. Existence is still unaffordable even with everybody employed. That's not spin, that's just the reality we've all been living in for a long time. The twin disasters of Trump and the pandemic put it all in stark relief, laying bare the grift of conservativism.
Biden is struggling because he's trying to play old politics. We've crossed the rubicon. Going back to normal isn't enough for people to feel hopeful, and reducing the rate of collapse isn't leadership. Biden thinks being at the helm while the ship slowly rights itself is the same as leadership, and there are enough people attacking him from the extreme other side that nobody is particularly happy with him.
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The looming recession talk is over. They’re ready to start making real money in the stock market again and are tired of the impact the recession talk had this year. It’s no surprise that it’s been about bang on a year since the recession talk started as we came into 2023 and the stock market hit record highs as we’re coming into 2024.
It was all fabricated for… reasons. Big orgs wanted to lay people off for some reason. Investment bankers wanted to gobble up securities for cheaper. Real estate firms wanted to drive down the real cost of homes (higher interest rates = lower sale price but higher cost to families, firms benefit by paying cash). They wanted it so they made it happen. They no longer want it so it’ll end.
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Indeed. Much as though I like my payments from JP Morgan, Jamie Diamon was one of the first to scream recession. He did that to increase his own wealth, not any other reason.
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That's true but peoples wages haven't gone up at a rate that keeps pace so everyone still feels poor and can't buy the things they need. That's the big issue. That's not been fixed and there is no plan to fix it. Now we all just have to wait around until our wages start to increase but we all know how long that takes.
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Americans are not stupid. You will not convince them the economy is good by spitting out some numbers twisted from the data. They feel it. They know how easy or hard it is to make ends meet. They know their rent goes up every year while their wages do not.
And the harder is gets, the more radical the population becomes. Establishment democrats like Biden will not be able to maintain the status quo. Normally I wouldn't care but their incompetence has consequences. A Trump victory at this point may signal the end of the US as we know it. We cannot continue to stay asleep at the wheel.
Your purchasing power has fallen over 20% in the last 3 years. We're talking and average of around 7% real inflation per year. Not the official "~3%" the government puts out. That's over 3x higher than average over the last 4 decades.
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The economy has been bad, but that doesn't change that it is getting better on many important metrics. These are leading indicators, predicting what will be, but the effects that people are feeling are more like lagging indicators that are reacting to the past and present. Hopefully we see these predictions play out in the next year before the election and into the next presidency.
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When it comes to "literal starvation" or "overthrow the shackles of oppression" I have a fair idea of what a lot of locals will choose.
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I prefer not to depend on feelings. My feelings can sometimes be wrong.. isolated data is not a prefered indicator, because it must be interpreted to be meaningful.
I've put several links in this string that should address your point.
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No one has been talking about a recession lately. The stories have all been shit is too expensive for the majority of Americans.
And...well...they're true.
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We’ll still get a thousand stories about a looming recession.
You haven't noticed? They've moved on to this election cycle's migrant caravan. Like fucking clockwork.
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Depends on how much of your income goes toward food.
Our food spend has tripled if not more over the past couple years.
If that was 2% of your net income, then spending 6% on food now isn't so bad.
If food spend was 10% of your net income, then switching to paying 30% of your income is a big fucking problem.
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Alternatively, "The Economy Is Booming And Everyone Is Doing Better, Here's Why This Is Bad News For Biden!"
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Well, consider me an a shitload of people I know and see stories about daily "nobody"
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Sure as fuck feels like it's already here for half the country.
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A new pet peeve. Not slamming, or blasting, but RIPPING. He tore these fuckers' jugulars out y'all!
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Yelling at cloud not effective, gotta pump up that headline.
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Translation: "we spent all this time massaging CPI and GDP, yall better report how great the economy is now!"
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When they report that the economy is great, always ask for whom...
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If you have to tell people how great the economy is, it's not that great.
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Translation: you pulled that from your ass. There is no evidence of manipulation of the indicators and those the Gov. is using match those of the business community.
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If Biden wants the media to cover him better he needs to do what Republicans do: give them a simple message. The other day I saw a Biden "I did that!" sticker on a national park fee payment station. Blatantly untrue? Yes. But it's simple and people aren't going to research or even think about whether park fees are Biden's fault.
"The economy sucks and it's the president's fault" is a simple message. But:
The U.S. unemployment rate was just 3.7 percent in November — barely above the pre-pandemic level of 3.5 percent, which was a five-decade low. Annual inflation has also fallen sharply from a peak of 9.1 percent in June 2022 to 3.1 percent in November, and the economy has defied widespread predictions of a recession.
These numbers will just be ignored. They don't fit in a headline or even an unpaid tweet. And I find people's natural reaction to numbers is to distrust them. "Yeah, but that's not the real unemployment/inflation/GDP/etc".
As for what that simple message can be, I have no idea. "Rising employment, plummeting inflation" might be an option, I dunno. But he needs to get someone in charge of messaging who will simplify things.
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The economy is doing great. Except for one thing. It's all being sucked up by the people who are already rich.
Everything we do to help just gets sucked up by the megacorporations and the already rich. I'm sure you know the feeling.
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The economy is doing great. Except for one thing. It’s all being sucked up by the people who are already rich.
Biden's supporters don't see why this is a problem.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
President Biden criticized news coverage of the U.S. economy as he faces growing backlash from voters over his handling of inflation.
In brief remarks Saturday before boarding the presidential helicopter, Biden expressed confidence in the economy and ripped the reporters for the way it has been portrayed.
The economy has roared back from the COVID-19 recession under Biden, who enacted legislation for trillions of dollars of economic relief and investments shortly after taking office in 2021.
Biden and his Democratic allies have largely blamed the media and Republican critics for skewing the public’s views on the economy by exaggerating recession fears and dismissing record-setting job growth.
Pandemic stimulus and restrictions also fueled a surge in home prices and rents, deepening an affordable housing crisis that began long before COVID-19.
Many voters are also struggling with the long-term changes to their jobs and industries caused by COVID-19, along with the lapse of economic relief programs that temporarily lifted millions of Americans out of poverty.
The original article contains 473 words, the summary contains 163 words. Saved 66%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
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The problem is the economy is good in metrics but not for the individual. Corporate greed is leaving most Americans worse off despite the "good" economy
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I think this is one of the things Trump got right: there should be a more adversarial relationship between politicians and the press. Of course Trump was adversarial because he wanted to do awful things, and also he wanted to set up a state media apparatus, but still.
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Well, Trump was adversarial to certain media outlets. Others, like FOX News, were All-But-State TV. They'd parrot whatever he said as the god given truth and he'd parrot whatever they said as truth. If Trump said that the election was stolen and COVID was no big deal, that's how FOX reported it. If they said that vaccines were dangerous and that immigrants were replacing "real Americans" (read: white people), he'd parrot that right back.
Also, adversarial relationships are good to a point. Biden is asking the media to cover things honestly. Trump was calling the media "The Enemy Of The People" and threatening to go after them (or encouraged his supporters to go after them) unless they fell in line. There's a huge difference between those two adversarial relationships.
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Do we have to label calling people on their shit "adversarial"? To me that word has a connotation of reacting unreasonably.
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One might just call it "reporting" 😉
I have the same connotation with word adversarial...
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I would think combative is closer to your connotation and adversarial is judgement neutral.
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What the hell are you talking about? Trump did massive damage to journalistic integrity as a whole. You ever hear the words "fake news" before he used it?
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Trump did massive damage to journalistic integrity as a whole
Not nearly as much damage as access journalism (e.g. Maggie Haberman style palace intrigue stories) did. The press and politicians being buddy-buddy is a disaster for journalistic integrity.
You ever hear the words “fake news” before he used it?
I did. The first time I heard it was on the PBS NewsHour, second half of 2016. Trump didn't really start using the term until 2017/late 2016, IIRC. They were using the term to describe news sites that felt like "official" news sites but were not journalistic, using social media to spread and get ad revenue.
To be clear, I'm not saying that Trump's press strategy was good. Overall it was harmful; but the adversarial nature specifically was good.
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I think he's actually saying the opposite.
Media reports say the economy is doing great because corporations are making record profits
Meanwhile wages continue to stagnate and prices continue to rise.
The economy isn't great just because rich people are making more money. It's only great when consumers have real purchasing power and are paid a good enough wage to circulate that money back into the economy.
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That could make some sense.
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The poor and uninformed are the last to see improvement. That doesn't mean things aren't getting better. Yet they are most likely to vote against their self interests.
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The poor and uninformed are the last to see improvement.
And the first to catch hell when things go to shit. When wages start to rise, the fed considers it a disaster to be averted.
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why all the complaints
if someone mentions voting for someone other than biden you are instantly a trump lover and if you mention voting for someone else other than democrat or republican you are are a biden hater
maybe there should be better reasons for voting other than shirt color or letter or name
188 comments
My wages have not gone up and the prices i pay are still going up.
But the economy is doing great! Billionaires and corporations are making record profits while eliminating thousands and thousands of jobs!
The DOW is a misery index. A measure of how much wealth can be extracted from the working class and reappropriated to the wealthy.
Ya but they fired one full time worker and replaced them with three part time workers! Progress!
I had someone try to tell me that the economy is better than ever, people are more rich than ever, and my "personal anecdotal evidence" can be completely dismissed.
It's no longer "personal anecdotal evidence" when 150,000,000 people are experiencing the same thing just in my own country.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
Seems like wages have been rising faster than inflation since February 2023. BR, super smart economist, probably
Mine and my wife’s have, it’s all anecdata, but we’re doing better than before.
Min wage not increasing and prices increasing isnt anecdotal
Get in a union. Or keep changing jobs just going to wherever will pay you the most.
I have a union job and a non union part time job. Pay has gone up a decent chunk at both over the past few years.
"Just get a new job" is a completely asinine take. Many many reasons people can't. Someone with a family working full time doesn't have the time or energy to develop the skills for a better job. Someone at fast food in a small town has the choice of other fast food or other retail which all pays the same.
In my wife's case, she cares for a disabled family member. If she didn't do it, nobody would. She has no choice.
Don't just get in a union. First, get to know if what they're doing is good for you, for the community, for the industry. Most unions have not been good for any of these in the last few decades.
I'll talk to biden and let him know of your situation. I'm sure he will do something tomorrow dw.
Ill let him know next November