New: 'America Has Never Been Wealthier. Here’s Why It Doesn’t Feel That Way'

markets are down this month, yet US household net worth just hit another record.
but everybody's been upset.
well before this tariff saga.
especially those in the bottom & middle thirds.

so what gives? talking about inequality is now somewhat out of fashion. very 2010s coded. but it hasn't gone away. It's gotten worse in a way. And data designed to capture the aggregate or median can obscure challenges experienced by a broad range of Americans, especially the bottom 50%.

Grocery Prices That Are Now In Outright Deflation* via @sonusvarghese

the truth has been spoken: "today, governments sell bonds to protect something more valuable than gold: a well-guarded secret about the true nature of their fiscal capacities, which, if widely understood, might lead to calls for "overt monetary financing" to pay for public goods"

https://twitter.com/martinwolf_/status/1777695886778212718

from Chancellor, the economic historian, and Kelton, the economist.

US GDP in Q4 was 3.4% (estimate 3.2%)
- Core PCE Price Index inflation comes in at 2.0% (estimate was 2.1%)
- Personal Consumption up 3.3% versus the 3.0% estimate
- Corporate Profits up 3.9% versus the 3.3% estimate

https://twitter.com/wabuffo/status/1773328675376636087

no matter how ya slice it, or how much some may revile reporters and others who simply point out that corporations are making out like bandits....it's true! they've done exceptionally well since the 1980s. and they're crushing it again.

My Sunday cover story for @nytimes Bizday, pt 3 of my in depth look at US inequality: I spent months reporting on the ground in Colorado, a hotspot for the new remote-hybrid class. It's spurred a housing crisis for locals & epic YIMBY vs NIMBY battles... https://t.co/iiFMOeVrsSnytimes.com/2023/08/17/bus…
2/riding up the cliffs & curves of the i70 corridor, snow still coats the cabin, condo & chalet filled slopes of 14k ft mountains on warm May days & you're like 'OK, i get it,' to the flocks moving & doing long visits here since covid allowed for remotehybrid work (including me?)

New: for pt 2 in my inequality series for @nytimes, i dug into a deeply painful paradox: if we've truly had 2 jobs for every 1 unemployed person, how is it that ~60% of all those leaving prison are unemployed (*seeking and not finding work*) a year later?
nytimes.com/2023/07/06/bus… --general unemployment is near record lows
--neoliberal economic models imply "full employment": that nearly "everyone who wants a job has a job."
--Yet those with records of imprisonment or arrests are often S.O.L. and disproportionately male & Black. That's who i focus on here:

1/Months in the making, here's the final cut of my story on the long-awaited wealth transfer, no longer in the future tense:
We're closer to 2053 than 1992.
Elites are already disbursing to heirs while alive.
The masses likely need luck or a paradigm shift
nytimes.com/2023/05/14/bus… 2/i've already heard from some saying "but what about___!?"
& yes...there's a 'directors cut' version noting___. but algos show ppl aren't reading features in full so we have to TLDR topics. read to the end to change that media trend :)

for now, here's a companion story thread:

Breaking: my @NYTimes investigation w/ @Fahrenthold reveals The Natl Restaurant Association’s lucrative scheme: $$ fees unwitting workers pay for ‘food safety certification’ are funneled to cover the costs of the groups’ Goliath battle against higher wages
nytimes.com/2023/01/17/us/… 2/ As a NRA CEO wrote in a board letter obtained by The Times: “The NRA is different from most traditional trade associations in our business model. Only
3% of our funding comes from dues and…our business initiatives,
primarily ServSafe and the NRA Show, fuel our revenue model”

New from me for @nytimes: This AM’s inflation report’s a relief but the Fed’s still gonna keep the cost of credit higher for longer than CFOs 1st expected…So is CorporateAmerica just unwinding from the ‘easymoney’ era or at any risk of ‘08 unraveling?…1/
nytimes.com/2022/11/10/bus… 2/the stock markets rough year captures most attention, but the corporate bond market—which creates, rates and directs operational funds for firms via bonds—has been clobbered: worst losses since 1926, since bond prices & interest rates are inverses, Fed rate hikes are a killer…

News: after months of calls & crawls through US bars & restaurants, my report for The Times finds, even now, in a historic robust labor market, wage theft, exploitation & lagging real wages related to the subminimum system for tipped workers is rampant..1/ nytimes.com/2022/10/13/bus… 2/ In all but ~8 states where tips simply come on top of the base wage all other workers are ensured, bosses can legally pay tipped workers below min wage—in some places as low as $2.13 an hour—*if* & only if that subminimum + tips *always = min wage pay in a given pay period...

Its “absolutely insane” @ Twitter right now in the virtual valves of private slack rooms & employee group texts, according to an internal source. Their take/breakdown just now:
“I feel like im going to throw up..I rly don’t wanna work for a company that is owned by Elon Musk”…1/ 2/ The source at Twitter continued “I don’t rly know what I’m supposed to do…oh my god, my phone’s been blowing up…We have a meeting about it at 5pm…the CEO is going to address everyone about it” (it=elon)

“I hate him, why does he even want this?” they asked…

During the lauded Reagan boom year of 1984 unemployment was 7% & inflation was still 4.3% ⚠️ with a little help from supply chains (and year over year changes flattening) the Biden WH could get a similar or better inflation number this year + GDP & unemployment just below ~ 4%… The good news for TeamTransitory (to the extent that camp still exists) is that businesses are self-reporting that the worst of supply chain problems may have passed.

Bad news, they still think resolution will take an awful while…

(charts via @OxfordEconomics)

New: i spent an unhealthy amount of time reporting on what's quietly become maybe the most complex yet crucial subject for 🌎, American society & its financial future

Why the economic laws of gravity on govt debt+inflation+borrowing costs appear broken ⚠️
nytimes.com/2022/01/30/bus… 2/ for those of you w/ actual lives, i know “public finances” is not a sunday read *but* what if i told you many experts say this weird chart (ppl are legit paying* to hold US DEBT) reveals both a Green New Deal (or a hawkish anti-CCP military buildup!) can be feasible via bonds?

My latest: At a moment when inflation fears are gripping financial markets, agitating gov't leaders & unsettling consumers, another unwelcome uptick is on the horizon: potentially crippling winter heating bills due to skyrocketing commodity prices. 1/ nytimes.com/2021/11/08/bus… The timing of these energy cost spikes is brutal for the Biden WH. It's also pretty cursed timing for the Fed — which literally *just* started a new policy framework meant to have a less knee-jerk reaction to inflation. And remedy options are limited. 2/
nytimes.com/2021/11/08/bus…

There's been a lot of subpar reports about the min wage lately & back and forth over white papers. This beautiful dispatch from Savannah by @Ariel_R_Felton instead brings us deep into the ecology & tension of kind places that force a cruel hustle to get by
nytimes.com/2021/02/26/opi… An adult must make at least $12.90/hr to meet the basic cost of living in Savannah...but Georgia merely complies with fed minimums. “Most of my friends in the industry, whether they be managers or servers and bartenders, are working two jobs,” Plowden said
nytimes.com/2021/02/26/opi…

A wk ago I got a tip: a leading $-in-politics watchdog is about to file a massive report to the FEC saying Trump2020 has "disguised nearly $170mill dollars of campaign spending by laundering the funds through firms headed" by top officials. It's out today:
vice.com/en_us/article/… 2/“The Trump campaign is violating the law,” Potter, who was appointed to the FEC in 1991 by George H.W. Bush and served as general counsel to John McCain’s 2000 and 2008 presidential campaigns, told me. “They are hiding information they are required to provide to the public.”