Rolling US Economy Into The Shitbin Thread

what is he actually talking about

And who is he?

what is he actually talking about

considering the profile of E-BIT-dee-AY Exit Multi🅿️le.usd, he's yelling about cryptocurrency

it's kind of sweet that he proudly announces that he's the financial equivalent of a rapist, then expects you to give full credence to his financial advice. he might as well have told his audience he'll absolutely, 100% guaranteed pull it out before he cums.

It’s a crypto thing

never trust a man wearing red socks

I look forwar to the days when I can rent a car again at less than it would cost to buy th ecar

We just booked a car from Hertz for June, even with the “manager’s special” — you take whatever they have abaila

Lol just noticed the end of that post got chopped off. Was saying, even with taking whatever they have on the lot, it’s $500 for 6 days.

That's honestly pretty good from what I went through last summer. o_O

Right before the pandemic, I booked one for 6 days in California. A Nissan Altima or something. 225$.

Yeah, I don’t rent cars very often, so I still have in my head that it’s like $30-$40 a day.

It was my first time, and I ended up having to get a refund because of the pandemic!

Oh no you're absolutely right, that's what I paid in summer 2020. But summer 2021 was remarkable--at one point last August I was quoted prices of several hundred dollars PER DAY.

I rented a car just ONCE, a few years ago, for work travel. (And had no choice but to rent it for logistical reasons.) The cost might have been $200-$300 for 3-4 days and I was ultimately reimbursed, but this was a crazy new, super tech car I’d never have had a chance to drive otherwise- a Dodge Charger or something - and I was constantly terrified about car accidents, thefts, dents. Just paranoid as hell and relieved when I turned it in at the airport.

This stuff is part of why when I travel for pleasure it’s cabs and Uber. $500 for 6 days? Yikes.

my car insurance has a clause to cover rentals too so I dont worry to much about that - more about spills on th einterior!

When I lived in Queens my trick was always just to rent from LaGuardia -- even if I had to take an Uber there it worked out very reasonable, like $40-50/day and NYC rental prices were always outrageous otherwise. I'm sure it's much worse now though.

Stewart Airport in Orange County is about to restart a bus service to and from NYC because I guess they're hoping their investment in a new terminal and a new European budget airline partnership will pay off. There's a car rental office at the airport, I'd definitely try that if I were looking for better pricing once that bus service starts.

trains wou ld be better if you could have your own private bubble

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/10/cpi-inflation-february-2022-.html

Inflation rose 7.9% in February, as food and energy costs push prices to highest in more than 40 years

we are making significant changes to our budget that was already on life support before this. really feeling this at the grocery store the last few trips.

We are very lucky to be able to weather this fine, but any budget we made has pretty much gone out the window. Hard to see how anyone can deal with it if they don’t have slack to begin with.

Time to write another big check to the food bank.

yeah, I have a monthly contribution to a few different food banks and it's time to up it

was just thinking about some of the progress made on child poverty rates last year with the child tax credit. Now with that gone and the current inflation rate these kids will suffer the most.

“OIL BALL”

H/T @AdsoOfBelk @_Jason_Dean_ @pacpaxpam https://t.co/T9KrTBLSVO pic.twitter.com/caKbbvhWdX

— MOAR Drilling (@MOAR_Drilling) March 10, 2022

Calling this now: Omicron breaking through in China will be a double whammy for global trade and therefore inflation.

China just declared a 7-day lockdown in Shenzhen -- home of one of the world's largest ports.https://t.co/5KhOESgbbi

— Christopher Mims 🤌 (@mims) March 13, 2022

hell yeah

Wayne Pankratz of @Applebees says that higher gas prices are great for business because most employees live check to check and hopefully they can start lowering wages. pic.twitter.com/BiRfeSmsYX

— Rob Gill 🇨🇦❤️🇺🇦 (@vote4robgill) March 23, 2022

weird, PUA ended almost 7 months ago

I mean, isn’t that just how labor markets work in capitalism? I’d be surprised if 90-95% of service industry/low wage employers aren’t having the exact same conversation behind closed doors.

it's the quiet part out loud, of course. bless the rat who leaked the email

it's an interesting statement but i'm skeptical that some podunk applebees exec has the correct model of the labour market. the rule of thumb that [anything happens] -> bad for workers under capitalism is a good approximation 99% of the time, but it's still worth thinking through the mechanism. and we're in weird times; the bottom 20% low wage workers have had high sustained real wage growth for the last 2 years, the first time that's happened in decades. no one knows exactly why, but something in this economy is working out to the advantage of low-wage workers

Updated figure on annualized nominal wage growth and CPI inflation (through Feb 2022), adjusting for composition.

Workers in the bottom 40% saw pay growth exceed inflation over past 24 months; share fell to 20% for past 12 or 6 months when inflation was higher.
1/ https://t.co/CzQoRCP14H pic.twitter.com/cp2sEDcMvB

— Arindrajit Dube (@arindube) March 25, 2022

usually inflation is associated with a tight labor market. the fed isn't planning on raising rates high enough to cut into inflation any time soon (they're hiking but will still be below "neutral" rates for another year or two). and people have been entering the labour force in record numbers which shows no sign of slowing

this logic can break down under cost-push inflation (rather than demand driven inflation from loose fiscal/monetary policy). i.e., if the rise in gas prices results in 1970s style stagflation where both unemployment and inflation are high. maybe unemployment will start to increase, but i'm not so sure. the shift back to consumption of services (after the historic shift away from services to goods during the pandemic) is a large secular force pushing the demand for labor up. and despite what pankratz says, the end of PUA/PEUC didn't seem to make much difference in labor supply

if gas prices cut into disposable incomes, that would also mean less demand for applebee's. and as high gas prices raise costs, that would also cut into applebees' profits. whether these are offset by lower labor costs is unclear.

also, everything depends on the fed. if the fed is accomodative, high prices can get pumped back into wages (wage-price spiral). if the fed goes full volcker and causes a recession, both prices and wages will fall and unemployment will increase

what's interesting to me in the statement is the part about mom and pops. his mechanism goes (1) rising oil prices will raise costs for applebees' small competitors, (2) they'll either cut hours, raise prices, or go out of business, (3) those that cut hours or go under will lower competition applebees faces.

this is kinda nerdy, but a key implicit assumption he's making is that mom and pops will have a harder time than big businesses passing the increase in costs onto prices. he's saying that the demand faced by small businesses is more elastic. i'm not sure if that's true

i appreciate the nerdy. and def wasn’t offering him up as an exemplar of the globalist cabal who are secretly pulling the strings and making the frogs gay

just enjoying a glimpse into the unpolished mind grapes of your average shitbird who makes everyone’s life in his orbit appreciably worse, and can only be rewarded for it

totally agree

ironically, after decades of strict adherence to chicago-style "perfectly competitive" models of the labor market where none of this stuff can matter, labor economists are just now catching up to the level of applebees' execs understandings of the labor market

it sounds insane (and is) but it's only in the last 5-10 years that the statement "employers set their own wages" has reached consensus. the previous consensus was that competition was so fierce, employers had no choice but to pay the going market wage

if gas prices cut into disposable incomes, that would also mean less demand for applebee's. and as high gas prices raise costs, that would also cut into applebees' profits. whether these are offset by lower labor costs is unclear.

Well sure, but I don't think he's saying what will offset what, he's just saying it's going to get easier to hire people if they are more strapped for cash, which is not only very likely true but the principle on which low wage labor entirely depends. Also, people in the class who do low wage jobs enjoyed unprecedented government benefits in the last two years that have since either ended or are coming to an end, so looking at the recent labor market may not give you a picture of what's to come.

I think it's good whenever people learn that this is how it works, but I wish people would understand that it's a system and not "some asshole at Applebees" (technically, not even at Applebees, just a large Applebees franchise owner) who makes it so

Also, people in the class who do low wage jobs enjoyed unprecedented government benefits in the last two years that have since either ended or are coming to an end, so looking at the recent labor market may not give you a picture of what's to come.

― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Sunday, March 27, 2022 4:08 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

it ended in September

i think you’re assuming/conceding a bit too much. it’s not clear that UI has a big effect on wages. wage growth didn’t change after the end of PUA. and when 21 states chose not to extend it in june didn’t have a big effect on wages. it’s not clear to me that rising gas prices will translate into lower wages either. if the labor market continues to be very tight, employers who are located far away from where workers live may even have to raise wages to compensate workers who commute

those dependent-child tax credits that were being delivered monthly as direct bank deposits only ended last January

I mean I clearly benefit from it too. like how else can you live a dignified retirement without Applebees parent company as part of your carefully balanced SEP IRA portfolio in the 21st century amirirte folks. line. gotta. go. up. ladies and gentlemen, The Economy

(jury out re me and my orbit)

those werent conditional on not working though like UI was. and the equivalent programs in Canada have little to no effect on labor force participation

xp aimless

like when Applebee’s guy says “we are no longer competing with the government for hiring”, he doesn’t have some special knowledge of how the labor market works, he’s just a conservative businessman saying things he believes

everyone seems to agree that we're headed straight for the shitbin once again, yay

exciting! https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-market-crash-crypto-tech-meltdown-wall-street-investors-hell-2022-5

NASDAQ is officially bear, yeah?

I heard some analyst saying that tech venture capitalists are now looking for 'ideas that actually work'... a stunning development

This was fun.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2022/05/why-this-computer-scientist-says-all-cryptocurrency-should-die-in-a-fire/

"And people keep finding out that just because something’s gone down 95% doesn’t mean it can’t still go down another 95%.

Grim stuff, thanks for sharing... I kept thinking I missed the boat, but you can only stay on this boat for a short time anyway

I get really sad whenever I hear people unthinkingly repeat that a stock drop means the stock "went on sale." Sometimes I try to use the metaphor of a Macy's "sale" price -- those shoes were never actually $550.

that BI article via archive because my paywall blocker didn't block:
https://archive.ph/gXkcO