Vibecession: The US economy in the Biden years

An evidence-based assessment by economist Robert Pollin:

The polling evidence on people’s perceptions about the economy are confusingly mixed. Thus, according to the most recent polls, most people respond that their own personal economic circumstances are in good shape. Most even say that conditions are good overall in their home states. But a majority do also still respond that, overall, the U.S. economy is in bad shape.

This pattern has been termed a “vibecession” — that people have a sense that the overall U.S. economy is in bad shape even while they themselves are fine, and even when, objectively, overall economic conditions, by standard measures, are indeed positive relative to the previous 50 years under neoliberalism. To cite now just the most basic relevant measures, the official U.S. unemployment rate, at 3.6 percent for 2023 and 3.8 percent for the first five months of 2024, is lower than at any comparable period over the past 54 years. The expansion of job opportunities has been across the board, in all economic sectors. Average real wages — that is, what you can buy with your paycheck, after adjusting for inflation — have also gone up across the board for the past 18 months, if only by about 1 percent.

I do need to emphasize that I am speaking in relative terms about the good economic conditions under Biden. Over his three years in office, Biden has certainly not reversed 50 years of pro-Big Business, anti-working-class policies under neoliberalism. As just one indicator, the average real wage — i.e. how much your wage can purchase, after controlling for inflation — was in 2023, at $28.90, almost exactly what it was in 1973. This is despite average labor productivity — what the average worker produces in a day — has more than doubled since 1973. This $28.90 average real wage today is also below a living wage standard throughout all U.S. regions, as measured by the MIT Living Wage Calculator.

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