The stock market is NOT the economy. The stock market is where people who have more money than they need to survive today gamble on how they think things will turn out tomorrow. It is booming now and the wealthy are making money and buying high-end second homes to hide from Covid-19 now that interest rates have been slashed. The economy, on the other hand, is working people in restaurants, clothing stores, farms, and businesses, both large and small, spending their earnings. Right now, our economy is only 80% as strong as it was pre-pandemic.
Truth is, the economy has never been as rip-roaring as the President pretends. Unemployment was low because many folks were working two and three jobs, without benefits like health insurance, to make ends meet. Gig jobs pay poorly; too many people were always a paycheck away from disaster. Truth is, half the jobs lost at the beginning of the pandemic are still gone today and half of those won’t come back. Truth is, there is no V-shaped recovery itching to roar back. Truth is, we’re in for a log slog and won’t return to a pre-Covid economy for a long while. Look around you; unemployed Americans without hope of another job or more unemployment relief to feed their families and pay rent still line up for assistance. Big companies are laying people off right now. Regal Cinemas, 40,000 jobs; Disney, 28,000 jobs; American Airlines, 25,000 jobs. America’s working class is still on its knees. The President tweets that America is leading the world in economic recovery and that the best is yet to come. Truth is, that simply doesn’t make it so.
Vote for President Trump if you believe he has real business skills, but truth is the stock market went up more under both Clinton and Obama. And the last truth is the President rode the coattails of an economic recovery started under the Obama/Biden administration following the Great Recession of 2009 that improved more in their last 3 years than it did under our current President, pre-Covid.
Regina A. Smith
Athens