• Psychodelic@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    In the telephone survey of 1,818 adults Aug. 10-14, 71% of Americans described the economy as either not so good or poor. And 51% said it’s getting worse.

    But 60% said their financial situation is good or excellent.

    Come the fuck on dude. How can you possibly believe that? And who’s upvoting all your comments?

    Everything you say now is suspect if you can believe that data is representative of most Americans. Not only that, you’re parroting the info everywhere like you’re confident in the data and knowledgeable on the subject, and yet it’s based on fucking phone interviews. What single, working mom do you think answers a random phone number and then is also willing to take an interview about the economy?

    • 31337@sh.itjust.works
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      6 months ago

      Statistically, some working mothers will answer the phone and finish the survey. If the survey was done correctly, and sampling bias and all that is accounted for, 1800 respondents is plenty to get a good representative picture of Americans. Surveys can work very well; even when using non-ideal survey methods.

      Anecdotally, this survey seems to align pretty well with the people I know. E.g. people complaining about a pie costing something like 30% more than 5 years ago, while their income doubled or tripled in that same timeframe. Help-wanted signs in my area seem to be advertising wages around 50% more than 2019 as well.

      • Psychodelic@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        I won’t debate your take on phone interviews being representative of any American under 80; I think it’s ridiculous

        About your anecdote, you’re saying you think some people earn double or triple at the same job? Surely not, right? So what about the people that still work at those jobs? How do you think life is going for them?

        • 31337@sh.itjust.works
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          6 months ago

          I don’t think anyone I worked with in 2019 has the same job (they were either promoted or switched jobs). For the people working those jobs now, I’m guessing the businesses needed to raise wages to attract new talent, probably more than the ~30% inflation. In regards to family I know that work service or manufacturing jobs, they either switched jobs for higher pay, got promoted, or their union negotiated decent pay increases. Again, I’m guessing most businesses needed to raise their wages to attract workers to replace those that switched jobs; and from the “help wanted” signs I see, it looks like they raised wages more than inflation.