Record income in USA
cohodk
Posts: 19,127 ✭✭✭✭✭
Let's hear from the naysayers 
. Although real anecdotal evidence would better serve us all. Tell your stories.
Excuses are tools of the ignorant
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
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USA! USA! USA!
I feel so much better now...
Rising income is good news.... rising employment even better.... Cheers, RickO
Yes but with eggs at $40 a dozen and gas at $12 a gallon you need all that record income
mark
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
That's when you'll need...... SILVER
A gain of 14% in just 3 short years. And to think some people though those 5% annual raises were a thing of the past.
I'd make more with a cardboard sign , unshaven and unkept... standing on a street corner, panhandling. I hear it pays about forty grand per year and up for entry level positions.
I think you're on to something there. Add in a $1,000 ACA subsidy and your income's almost to the median.
Meh , I can't find the link now but I saw somewhere yesterday that the increase is down to more hours worked rather than increased salary. Work more hours to make more money doesn't impress me, we already had that.
Pencil me in as a Nay
Loan delinquency rates appear to have bottomed during the past year and are now starting to creep up again.
This is true for loan types of: student; automobile; credit card; and traditional mortgage. Only the loan type of revolving home equity has a lower delinquency rate now than a year ago.
Every one of those squiggly lines is lower today than 12 years ago, save for student loans. Really is hard to find much negative in that graph.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
So maybe the question you should ask yourself is why are these folk able to work more hours?
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Franchise opportunities are available.
My brother likes to say"Everybody's broke,just at a different level".
If incomes are rising, then why aren't delinquency rates going DOWN ?
And there's record DEBT in the USA too.
Because real wages aren't rising and total income for those in the bottom quartile continue to drop.
Income inequality in 2017 stands at historically high levels if anyone cares.
If you draw a moving average you will see rates are dropping.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
On a nominal basis, yes. Unfortunately the media has no concept of inflation or debt to income ratios which clearly show debt to be much, much lower than 2008.
AND, household net worth is at a record.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Income for the bottom quartile has and always will grow more slowly than the top quartile. Mathematics dictates this.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
USA USA USA WERE #1 !
Did I do that right @renman95
Anyone been shopping lately?
4 years later, my exact same standard package/option truck is 7gs more, for a dial knob shifter thing and some stupid dash computer for the radio that both can't be optioned out. I imagine there's a lot more/other offset going on with the 'record income'.
You know we are a fatter (literally) people. If that's not a correlating factor, then we can blame genetically modified organisms, instead of crediting higher income. There are still a record number on the dole.
There will always be a record number on the dole. Population dynamics dictate this.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Life will always be great. Rose glasses dictate this.
"Interest rates, the price of money, are the most important market. And, perversely, they’re the market that’s most manipulated by the Fed." - Doug Casey
Everyone I know named Rose , wears glasses .
Beats the alternative, every time
Liberty: Parent of Science & Industry
Bumper sticker
"Despite the high cost of living, it's still popular"
Bumper sticker:
"Despite inflation the wages of sin remain the same."
Live and learn.... to love. Okay, out of the pulpit and back in the saddle.
With more people working in each household, for longer hours, and lower benefits, it's no surprise household median income is at a "record." All those seniors "back to work" at McD's, Walmart, Home Depot, Lowe's, etc because they can't afford to stay retired is a nice boost for median income. Median income in the mid 1980's ($45K) is 24% less than it is today ($59K). Yet the standard of living was probably significantly higher....with a much larger middle class. Cost of housing, education, "well equipped" new cars/SUV's, taxes & fees, has risen a lot faster than median income.
Create $4-$12 TRILL in extra digi-debt money/assets out of thin air over the past 8 yrs, and some of it (1-10%) was bound to trickle down into median income.
Also people live longer so they have to work later in life.
All those seniors "back to work" at McD's, Walmart, Home Depot, Lowe's, etc because they can't afford to stay retired is a nice boost for median income.
Actually more households working at low wage jobs brings DOWN the median income. And corporate benefits are much greater than 30 years ago....401k, medical, paid time off, many companies are now also paying student loans.
Many people have voluntarily increased their monthly expenses over the last 30 years, such as cell phone and cable TV, dining out, ect.
The rest of your response is supposition, opinion, and hyperbole. Thank you for sharing though.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Looking at charts H2 and H3 I don't see a lot for the Median "middle 5th" to cheer about. Yes, they took out the previous peaks from 1999/2000 by +$260 over a 16 yr period....approx +$16/yr.....yowzer! I'd bet most workers would happily trade that +$260 for the medical benefits packages they had 10-20 years ago. I was paying $5500 per year for a 2 person, generic HMO medical plan in 2009 ($10K deductible). Today that same plan is probably $15K/yr, even if it's even offered. I'll pass on the +$260 "income increase." Just let me keep my original plan and doctor.
Notice that each period seems to max out during a SM peaking period. Inflation adjusted Middle 5th income not all that much improved from 1989 ($54K to $59K). And not really much improved from 1973 ($50K) when real wage earner income last peaked. You can be sure that the costs of many bigger ticket items have been far exceeded by " CPI inflation adjusted" income increases (homes, education, taxes, fees, professional trade labor, etc.). The cost of tuition, room and board at a highly competitive, private univ/college in the mid-$1970's was $20-25K for 4 years. Today more like $250K. That doesn't fit with CPI's 4.5X increase.
The share of aggregate income for the first 3-4 fifths of households has been in decline (-19 to -26%) for approx 50 years....while the upper 5th (+20.8%) and upper 1% (+38.6%) have been climbing. But let's do cheer about the record median income from 2016.
https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/income-poverty/historical-income-households.html
Let's also cheer about the lower claimed poverty levels. A two member family (under age 65) household saw their poverty threshold rise from $15,952 to $16,151 last year. I'm sure that's lots to cheer about. If they were making $15,900 last year, they were in poverty. This year at $16,200 due to an $300 annual work bonus because of record corporate profits....they are out of poverty.
The myths of recovery: Why American households aren’t better off
"Materially, U.S. households’ disposable risk-adjusted incomes are lower today than they were in 1999. That explains why American households are drowning in debt: the demand for income vastly exceeds the supply of income, even as the official median household size shrinks and cost of housing is being deflated by children staying in parents’ homes for decades after college. The rosy times are not upon us, folks."
"Interest rates, the price of money, are the most important market. And, perversely, they’re the market that’s most manipulated by the Fed." - Doug Casey
My grandparents and parents have been teaching me gloom and doom since I began to talk as a child. Probably before I could read. We have been in a depression or recession my entire lifetime according to them. This place is actually a bowl of cherries compared to my Polish upbringing.. I will sally forth regardless.
mark
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
disputing the rosey economic picture that is being painted by Washington, it's media mouthpieces and a few here, is not a forecast of gloom and doom. It is a matter of being able to see through the smoke and mirrors. Knowing truth better prepares one for its results.
"Interest rates, the price of money, are the most important market. And, perversely, they’re the market that’s most manipulated by the Fed." - Doug Casey
So if those households with workers 65+ were only collecting SS instead of supplementing it with McD's, Walmart, Home Depot, Lowe's, cleaning houses, etc the median would drop even though their income increased? Not likely.
Remember "income" including gov't transfers including the ACA. That's why the bump started in 2014.
At least you didn't grow up to be a grumpy old man like many here.....but theres still time for you. Lol
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
No....it's called having optical rectumitis.....aka, a $hitty outlook.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Debt Free and Loving It
Menomonee Falls Wisconsin USA
http://www.pcgs.com/SetRegistr...dset.aspx?s=68269&ac=1">Musky 1861 Mint Set
They're capitalizing on daylight saving's time.
Some seniors over age 65. My definition of "seniors" in this example are those in the age bracket of 54 and up, not yet retired, maybe looking for work and can't find what they are trained in. This group is not collecting SS. Their formerly higher incomes now replaced by McD and WM, HD.
My definition of "seniors" in this example are those in the age bracket of 54 and up, not yet retired, maybe looking for work and can't find what they are trained in
Then they are unskilled labor with a higher chance of health costs and should be paid accordingly.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Or they are skilled labor with personal issues including physical and/or mental health problems preventing them from working in their field(s). Or perhaps they have family concerns preventing them from moving to areas where better jobs or located.
Certainly health costs go up as people age. These days way up........
Surely....but are those factors that are preventing them from getting a job reflective of a bad job market?
Knowledge is the enemy of fear
Im 55 took early retirement in 2009. I now get a small retirement check and earn rest of my income farming. I said a big FU to modern day manufacturing and 70+ hour work weeks! Yes the "unskilled labor" crock! They work the good workers to death pray on the one with many children they know are in debt. Before I retired I was doing 4 jobs for the same pay I was when I was hired 10 years earlier to do one! Most the unskilled Labor is the lazy A** 16 to 40 crowd. Rather stay home than work. Why should they work when they dont have too. Lazy A** is just not as PC as "unskilled".
Not at all. There's been a seismic shift in the job market though. Disincentives to working full-time have never been higher. The gov't freebies have tens of millions of Americans out of the job market (or working part-time) and not included in measured unemployment. BLS has always underreported true unemployment but today they're picking pick less than half the true number.
For those with the right skills in the right places the jobs are out there. They may not pay that well and the benefits might not be great but they're there. It is scary that the Financial Services empire has grown into a multi-trillion dollar industry that rivals health care in size.
I'm always reminded of a statement my brother told me years ago, with respect to management of said:
" When your output exceeds your income, your upkeep will be your downfall."
$6 per pound for bacon.
$2.50+/oz for jerky
Even scarier if you consider how ridiculously big healthcare is.
One of the problems is the perception of those current 60 year old middle managers making less than they did 20 years ago in the same position. They just don't realize how grossly over paid they were.
Knowledge is the enemy of fear