from Hacker News

Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

by kvee on 12/4/24, 5:53 AM with 2210 comments

by pfooti on 12/4/24, 6:17 AM
https://archive.is/vt7sY
by myflash13 on 12/5/24, 7:45 AM
If you go to the doctor with a problem and get a blood test and they say that everything looks fine, but you don’t feel fine, then you don’t say: “well the numbers are right, I should feel fine”. Rather you try to find what the numbers aren’t capturing, because you know something is wrong. Same with the economy. The perception of the economy being bad is really pervasive as demonstrated by the last election, and perception matters, because selective numbers don’t tell the whole story.
by roenxi on 12/4/24, 6:45 AM
This is an interesting take, because it contrasts with GDP PPP [0] which is suggesting that America is in fact being overtaken by its rivals although it has managed to outpace the EU. China is claiming to already be ahead and India is well on track to gain absolute economic ascendancy relative to the US. And I expect that Asia is going to start developing some serious military muscle on the back of that because they have access to the history books and have a pretty good view into how Western leadership thinks.
If the US is benchmarked against Europe then all is well. The problem is that Europe is now a distant 3rd in terms of economic power - it can't face up to China. Arguably, if we put China in its own category and India into "Asia" then the EU might be pushing towards 4th. Everyone is still ahead of Africa I suppose.
[0] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/national-gdp-wb?tab=chart...
by slifin on 12/5/24, 2:37 PM
The US dollar is the world's reserve currency So countries keep huge stores of dollars in their reserves because they need it for trade Then what happens is the US starts the money printer to pay for US government services This inflates the dollar and means that everyone who holds the dollar has lost value
Including Americans who are paid for their labour with dollars and do not own assets
So wealthy Americans/companies see an influx of money, asset prices rise and every other country gets poorer relative to the USA
by hunglee2 on 12/5/24, 7:50 AM
GDP is a measure of the marketisation of society.
If I go visit my grandma over the weekend, my activities do not register on GDP. If I hire a care assistant for $800 per day to do so, that's $800 to national GDP. The encroachment of the market into society correlates with record levels of mental and physical health crisis. US life expectancy has declined over the past three years, even as 'the economy' has surged ahead. The measures are wrong - and we all know it - apart from the financial press it seems
by rich_sasha on 12/4/24, 7:23 AM
One thing this article doesn't touch on is the soaring government debt, which is now really quite big: 120%, and IIRC if you add municipal debt, it's more like 140%. That is high. It also seems like much of the recent growth has been fueled by this debt.
It's unclear how this is going to unwind. America can afford, apparently, to run their deficit hot, but not forever and without limit. So at some point they have to start cutting expenditure and paying that debt off. What happens then? Or will they somehow default on it? Or, will they manage to deflate it via growth. But it is a bit of a sword of Damocles hanging over the economy, like ZIRP over VC successes of the 2010s.
The crazy thing is just how much the debt increases in living memory. Under Clinton, it was as low as 60%, which is considered a really low level.

by sriram_malhar on 12/5/24, 3:52 AM

I like Vinod Khosla's take (on Twitter):

   Stop measuring GDP and instead measure the total income of the bottom 50% of the population and optimize policy for that. Additions and exits from this group can also be tracked. We get what we measure. Will this raise income inequality?

by lifeisstillgood on 12/4/24, 7:59 PM
Tech is the problem. The internet is global (or perhaps two or three regions), and winner takes all - so global value creation is being experienced everywhere, but being monetised in the US stock market.
Take tech out of the equation and the US is pretty much on par with EU, and China and India are just burning the coal for everyone else.
by dannyobrien on 12/5/24, 5:47 PM
Just to throw in another opinion, one that I think will be guaranteed to annoy the majority of commenters so far: This piece argues that the US isn't doing that well economically in absolute or historical terms, but only looks like that way because the popular point of comparison, Europe, is doing even worse:
https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2024/12/04/us-economy...
by spaceguillotine on 12/4/24, 10:18 PM
I've never known more homeless people before in my life in America, seems like its only the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer and less healthy.
by DrBazza on 12/4/24, 8:03 PM
These articles also gloss over the US market is 400m English speakers with one set of legislation, more or less. Europe is 20+ languages and 20+ sets of legislation. That’s a colossal advantage. And any clicks and mortar business gets the benefit of absurdly cheap shipping costs compared to Europe.
by HellDunkel on 12/4/24, 9:01 PM
When younger, i often thought about moving to the US because it offered so many amazing and creative places to work. Most of these places seem to have gone completely or are in a somewhat unhealthy state (hollywood, video games). Boring tech companies took over and often times they stared with just a website - for gods sake- this is so lame! I‘m so happy i didnt go back then- I think it would have depressed me to experience this first hand but who knows.
by mesk on 12/4/24, 8:22 PM
I'm thinking a lot lately about which country would be best for my future, and somehow US is never there. Maybe for me without family yes, but otherwise I see it like there, I would be one illness away from bankrupcy, one crazy kid with a gun away from family tragedy, one <what if> away from <unsolvable problems>. Sure, being in top 10% is cool, but will my kids be also so lucky? And the middle class in the US already thinks they are struggling (hence the last vote) - as someone said numbers can't feed you. But, hey, I'm maybe too old ;)
by lenerdenator on 12/5/24, 2:47 PM
The American stock market is soaring ahead of its rivals.
Stock markets are just an indicator of how surplus value is distributed to shareholders, not a picture of actual economic health.
by badpun on 12/4/24, 7:56 PM
Not a single word about shale oil and gas revolution, that started around 15 years ago? The US now has the one of the cheapest energy on earth, and probably the cheapest among the countries that matter. Pour all that cheap gas and oil onto an economy that was already a leader and you get lots of impressive growth.
by elzbardico on 12/5/24, 12:43 PM
During the peak of Brazil’s Military Rule and the Economic Miracle in the early 1970s, one of the General-Presidents, Emílio Médici, made a strikingly honest remark:
“The economy is thriving, but the people are not.”
by karaterobot on 12/5/24, 1:06 AM
I knew that if I clicked into this thread, I'd learn about how this was actually bad news.
by skybrian on 12/4/24, 9:50 PM
Krugman pointed out [1] that 10% of US GDP is in tech counties and Manhattan, with 4.4% of employment.
I wonder if productivity growth is mostly there too?
[1] https://bsky.app/profile/pkrugman.bsky.social/post/3lcii6zna...
by loufe on 12/4/24, 9:05 PM
It's also the distorted ability to rack up ungodly amounts of debt without facing the normal consequences of doing that. The US economy is booming, but it's borrowing from two decades from now to fuel the moment. When their debt gets unmanageable, the world's economy will enter a depression, IMO.
by anon291 on 12/4/24, 7:13 PM
Thomas Sowell says that equality of opportunity leads to inequality of outcome. And this is the main difference between America and the rest of the world. The articles cites innovation-growth v cost-cutting as sources of increased productivity, and this parallels this dichotomy.
People interested in equality of outcome and a level playing field have to compete on cost. There's a social stigma against sticking out and achieving more, lest you become unequal, and the governments are well aware of that.
Meanwhile, innovation literally desires to reward disproportionately he who comes up with the new product. The entire purpose of the American economic system is to produce inequality.
This, combined with America's relative freedom from prejudice, is an unstoppable juggernaut. It is absolutely insane how easy it is in the United States to be handed money with limited liability to go and do whatever you want with it. This is a true blessing, and we see it not just in venture capital, but in the plethora of small businesses, as well as the plethora of credit (for better or worse).
Yes, there are problems, but I think history will show that this model is ultimately more sustainable. While true that America's productivity growth has only really taken off over the last century or so, even before then, it represented a formidable economic player.
by WalterBright on 12/4/24, 6:32 AM
> the improvement was largely down to reconstruction efforts partly funded by the US via the Marshall Plan
Most of the improvement was in Germany, which received far less MP money than Britain and France.
Postwar prosperity correlates with the level of free markets. Germany embraced free markets up until 1970, Britain and France did not.
by grecy on 12/4/24, 6:43 AM
Make no mistake, the US is a fantastic business. It makes a lot of money, and some people get fantastically rich while others toil for life and hover at the poverty line.
With a vastly higher percentage of its citizens in jail than any other developed country, much higher crime and violence than developed countries and many other very bad indicators it is, however, not a good country. It does not provide for or look after its citizens in the ways other developed countries do, and does not appear to be a healthy society.
by sharpshadow on 12/5/24, 9:00 AM
The DAX reached this year a new record of over 20000. Is Germany doing good right now? On the news reports they even have to mention that it’s how the investors predict the future market, because everybody here know the economy is shit atm.
If I’m not mistaken most of the growth in the capital market comes from the continuing money „printing“ right?
by mytailorisrich on 12/4/24, 6:51 AM
This has been the case for decades now.
The US economy is much more dynamic than Europe's and the US government is actually more willing to intervene (and can afford it because of US dollar).
In Europe it is austerity and general less support for economy-boosting policies.
by steveBK123 on 12/5/24, 6:52 PM
US economy is soaring because the old guard (Europe) passed peak and all the new guard (Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China, BRICS) didn't quite live up to the hype once they reached near wealth parity.
Where would you rather invest today - US or a demographically stagnant, highly regulated Europe? US or rapidly shrinking countries with risk-averse cultures like Japan and Korea? How about China where they might expropriate you / throw you in jail? Or Taiwan which is under the cloud of Chinese invasion?
Etc.
Cleanest dirty shirt and all that.
by athrowaway3z on 12/4/24, 8:21 PM
It is frankly absurd to make a case with only one line mentioning
> owing to its abundant domestic energy supplies,
Energy is wealth. In so far as I can tell we have better data, going back further, and being more strongly correlated to outcomes of interests, than the data we have on monetary systems. I have my doubt the FT will ever dare to entertain that position.
Energy has an enormous cascading effect. But it pops up directly as well. ChatGPT could not run at 5x the base energy costs and no suppliers able to scale to more demand.
If you're looking to explain the US upward trends always include their shale output in your graph as well. You'll find you rarely need more explanations.
It has been blessed by their resources, an enormous size granting a low population density, and a functioning liberal state to use those well.
The rest is pandering and ideological pleas for less tax and less regulations.
And i mean... if you're going to pander, you're going to pander to the people with the cheapest energy.
by epolanski on 12/4/24, 11:45 PM
Because America has the right mix of ingredients of greed, capital, culture, know-how, regulations, etc to thrive in the age of IT and finance.
Those who replicate the formula may not have the ingredients and those who do have the ingredients use different formulas.
by jcfrei on 12/5/24, 12:13 PM
I've given the strength of the US economy a lot of thought recently and it comes down to 8 main reasons. The two obvious ones are:
- Liberal labour and corporate laws
- abundance of resources (fossil fuels + fertile soil)
The other 6:
- Low housing prices due to vast land reserves and cheap construction. leaves more capital available to invest into the stock and bond markets
- An excellent system of highways. reduces transportation costs for companies and allows for high labour market flexibility (+ high willingness of Americans to commute large distances)
- Coherent labour market that spans roughly 330M people
- A nation wide well established 401k system that funnels a lot of the retirement savings into US stocks and bonds - incl. venture capital.
- higher affinity for risk taking. Americans are in large parts descendants of risk taking expats
- Large maritime borders and only two (friendly) neighboring countries
by nyeah on 12/5/24, 3:43 PM
Good as far as it goes. But employees don't get paid in productivity, we get wages.
by vondur on 12/5/24, 4:50 PM
I guess compared to most of Europe, which is getting poorer? I think the coming decades will now be dominated by the growth of the Indian economy, who will probably be the biggest beneficiary of the worldwide de-investment in China.
by tjahsg on 12/4/24, 8:49 PM
These opinion pieces are so tiring. Talking points:
- The sanctions induced energy crisis exists, but is not the reason.
- The lazy Europeans are the problem.
- We need more tech.
- Trump will ruin everything.
All of this is false. There is no mention of the dollar status as the reserve currency, which enables the reckless U.S. deficit spending while shielding it from the consequences.
There is no mention of German industries, which had been productive, closing or moving abroad after the Nord Stream sabotage by one of Germany's "allies".
There is no mention that tech is overvalued and not a panacea. Russia does have Yandex as a Google replacement and it does not help. China has Baidu. So tech in the U.S. has been inflated by printing money, which the EU and China cannot do.
I expect more from a European newspaper than just telling Europeans to work harder.
by myflash13 on 12/5/24, 10:06 AM
For some reason I can’t help but think of the analogies of our current situation to the last years of the Soviet Union, when on paper it looked like a juggernaut albeit with decrepit leaders, but the numbers were lies, more lies and statistics. The elites were filthy rich but the situation on the ground was unraveling - basic services were starting to fail (analogies to Private Equity ruining everything in America from clinics to plumbing). And then you have Gorbachev who recognized the situation and attempted a “perestroika” (analogous to Trump and his reformist policies including DOGE) but that led to the final collapse. The analogies are just too many, even the failure in Afghanistan.
by wslh on 12/4/24, 6:43 PM
My two cents: the U.S. owes much of its economic strength to its robust legal framework. It provides a system where complex business disputes can be handled and enforced effectively, creating trust and predictability for investors and entrepreneurs. This institutional strength is often overlooked but is critical for fostering innovation and long-term economic growth. Incidentally, recent Nobel laureates in economic sciences have focused on the role of institutions in shaping economic outcomes, underscoring how pivotal they are to success.
by loftsy on 12/5/24, 11:10 AM
I long for a US-like entrepreneurial attitude here in the UK. Business people here think that they are playing zero sum games. Everyone looks to the govt for funding and direction.
I am reflecting on Deepmind. This company saw the AI revolution before anyone else. London based. They did an amazing job. Sold to Google. The problem is that long term the growth and money now goes back to the US. Maybe the UK is just too small to produce world leading companies.
by fxtentacle on 12/4/24, 6:53 AM
It's thanks to innovative business models, of course!
Increasing you investment efficiency with FTX. Reducing farmer idle time with Deere. Sharing your otherwise unused car with Uber. Revolutionising office productivity with technology, like those beer taps that WeWork had. Spending less time on your savings with Yotta. Not reading long emails with AI.
I wonder how high productivity actually turns out if you remove every scam that inflated GDP or earnings numbers.
by didibus on 12/4/24, 6:47 AM
I'm never able to get to the "so what?" with these. Productivity growth sounds nice, but then it mentions that there's more inequality, higher cost of living, and more workers struggle in the US than other developed countries. How do I reconcile this?
They make a point that eventually the other countries' economies would shrink and won't be able to afford those benefits, but also the US doesn't have those benefits even now.
Anyone can elucidate me?
by joejohnson on 12/5/24, 1:26 AM
One of America’s biggest rivals is in fact the EU and a unified Eurasian continent. But luckily the ties connecting this continent literally blew up, the price of energy in Western Europe skyrocketed and it sent Germany (and thus the whole EU) into a recession. Even better, these “allies” are being forced to fund their own demise.
by gorfian_robot on 12/5/24, 4:04 PM
why does this article conflate the existence of AI startups with strong economic growth for the last four years? it is almost like there is another factor at play ....
by satao on 12/5/24, 4:10 PM
America is a de facto keynesian state while the European Union is pushin austerity since 2008
by Kon5ole on 12/4/24, 9:39 PM
Being poor is really terrible in the US, being rich is really great. Everybody learns this from day 1 and get reminded of it almost daily.
There are downsides to such a society but it creates a strong incentive to get rich, or at least to never become poor, and thus more economic activity.
by anon291 on 12/4/24, 7:07 PM
> Globally, the top R&D spenders are increasingly concentrated in software and computer services
I always find these sorts of statements strange because most software is not intended to be software but rather something else. For example, Adobe's suite should be classified under 'art supplies' or 'video production'. While true that it's software, in my mind, it's like classifying a car builder as a metal fabricator.
The truth is software and computers are pervasive today. There's rarely any software (other than development tools) that are truly aimed at computers themselves. Almost all software today is used for other industries and ought to be classified under that.
Under this taxonomy, I think things would seem much more diverse.
by redeux on 12/4/24, 10:28 PM
The results of the last election tell a much different story. If the economy was soaring for the average person then I don’t think control of the government would have changed or at least not as dramatically.
by Entalpi on 12/4/24, 9:23 PM
Does anyone know of a more accurate economic measurement of growth rather than GDP?
Building bombs a la Russia and paying a lot for healthcare is great for GDP but are those money well spent to grow the economy?
by croes on 12/4/24, 7:16 AM
Simple answer. The US don’t fear high debts like for instance Germany does.
by wg0 on 12/4/24, 9:03 PM
It is basically soaring because there's a drive to pull things from China. That is posting lots of economic activity for sure.
Others in contrast aren't in that race to cordon off from China.
by ginko on 12/4/24, 6:43 PM
The headline is about America's rivals but then talks mainly about EU and other G7 economies.
Do Americans consider Europeans their rivals? Occasional competitors sure, but rivals?
by gadders on 12/5/24, 11:00 AM
We have a strange situation in the UK where GDP is going up (thanks to immigration) but GDP per person is actually going down (thanks to immigration).
by fragmede on 12/5/24, 11:23 AM
What turns commenters so smarmy and grumpy when the topic is historical? So many comments are uncurious swipes telling each other to read a book.
by TriangleEdge on 12/5/24, 1:23 AM
America is so prosperous that there's armed guards in grocery stores here in Seattle.
by arkh on 12/5/24, 8:13 AM
> Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals
Because young people are not taxed to pay for retired people vacations. And because there is less of a credential obsession for most jobs.
So you get people starting to work younger: they create value earlier instead of being a pure weight on the system.
They're taxed less so they keep more of their money so they're established (house, business etc.) earlier and can spawn a new generation earlier.
Most of the socialized states have become gerontocracies where most of the GDP is funneled from the young actives to the retirees. Be it from socialized healthcare (old people use the majority of it), cushy retirement benefits or the simple fact they own most property and can rent it and lobby to keep prices high.
In France, median retirees have enjoyed better revenues than median working people for multiple years already. What was created so old people who can't work would not be destitute has become a life goal because it's "when you can start to enjoy things". 50 years ago, we had 3 active people paying for 1 retiree. Now those 3 people? We only got 1.7 active people paying for each of them.
Either the current working generation decides to stop the cycle and sacrifice themselves by continuing to pay for baby boomers and they forego their own "end of life vacation" so their rare grand children can benefit from their own work. Or the country is a third world economy next century.
by nextworddev on 12/4/24, 11:25 PM
It’s called having world’s reserve currency plus leader in tech platforms and AI.
by pattt on 12/5/24, 1:20 PM
Different regions play complementary roles in the global economy. The oversimplified description is that the US drives innovation and risk-taking, Europe prioritizes social welfare and sustainability and Asia powers manufacturing. Forcing everyone to compete in the US-style growth race would be disastrous - imagine the burnouts, resource drain and market instability if every country tried to be Silicon Valley. Plus, many Europeans simply don't share the "get rich quick" mentality - they value work-life balance and social security more. Whether we're being pushed into this growth-obsessed game is another debate. Ideally, regions should focus on their strengths while maintaining independence. Europe can keep its social model while smartly adopting tech, Asia can focus on sustainable industry, and the US can lead in innovation. It's like an ecosystem - diversity makes it stronger. The goal shouldn't be for everyone to play the same exhausting game, but to maintain different approaches that complement each other.
by almaight on 12/4/24, 6:41 AM
Because people have been liberated from the quagmire of handicrafts
by ffitch on 12/5/24, 4:27 PM
2.8% GDP (and labour productivity) growth doesn’t look that impressive when budget deficit is at 6.4%. A large portion of US GDP is domestic consumption.
by insane_dreamer on 12/5/24, 3:35 PM
If you look at the "American economy" as "corporate growth and wealth", then yeah, it's doing great. Best in the world.
But if you look at it as "the economic wellbeing of the country's citizens", then it's average at best.
The second measure is the one that matters. Enough with the debunked trickle down economics bullshit.
by whateveracct on 12/5/24, 6:38 PM
the funny thing to me about the "Well, I'm not doing good in this economy" anecdata rebuttals to the reportedly good US economy is that..people have always lived paycheck to paycheck in the US economy. Eliminating that shouldn't be the benchmark for "good." Literally everyone can't be a winner all the time.
by amelius on 12/5/24, 9:22 AM
Meanwhile US infrastructure is crumbling down.
by flkenosad on 12/5/24, 11:54 AM
Some day we'll have so much digital money we can buy whatever we want! Too bad there won't be any trees left...

by thomassmith65 on 12/4/24, 6:53 AM

That's an excellent summary of the economic state of the world. This excerpt is depressing...

  The challenge for other advanced economies is not just replicating America’s dynamism. It is to do so while retaining their cherished social safeguards.
  For all its economic power, the US has the largest income inequality in the G7, coupled with the lowest life expectancy and the highest housing costs, according to the OECD. Market competition is limited and millions of workers endure unstable employment conditions.

The pessimistic take is that American FA*NG 'enshittification' and cheap Chinese plastic junk will continue to eat the world, while other nations abandon consumer- and labor-friendly policies.

by sufehmi on 12/5/24, 12:04 PM
https://archive.md/t8z0P
by maxehmookau on 12/5/24, 3:30 PM
Is it because corporate profits are put ahead of the living standards of the masses? I bet it's that.
by leokennis on 12/5/24, 10:23 AM
And yet, mysteriously, somehow, as a European, I am pretty glad not to be a US citizen right now. I earn more than enough to live while working only 36 hours per week and my government is not run by lunatics.
by locusm on 12/5/24, 12:33 AM
Australia has gone backwards in the last 3 years - I think we sit around 20th in the world now.
by jurli on 12/5/24, 7:25 PM
It's kind of crazy that with so many opinions on economics, no one ever mentions the most obvious things.
When elite papers say the "economy is doing well," what they usually mean is "the GDP is going up way higher than other places." What exactly is a GDP? It's literally the total sum of money SPENT by government, consumers, and businesses combined (this is the textbook definition, and how it's calculated).
When prices of stuff go up by 25% because there's a shortage of labor, or shortage of material, or shortage of infrastructural efficiency, by definition the GDP goes up 25%. There isn't any increase in life quality, nor any increase in the amount of stuff produced. This is why people feel like the economy is complete shit, while all the numbers point to the economy is doing well, and all the institutions that rely on these data (think tanks, policymakers, journalists) are baffled why people don't feel the same.
In contrast, in places that produce things very cheaply, if the export goes down, its GDP numbers will go down by definition. This in turn causes an overflow of goods internally, and prices paid by internal consumers even lower, therefore decreasing the GDP numbers even more. This is the opposite of the above scenario, where people are getting better things for cheaper, and their lives are improving without any increase in total compensation. All the while the numbers are telling a different story.
I think GDP might have been one of the biggest red herrings for policymakers. It's distorting their view of what's going well and what isn't.
by lifeplusplus on 12/5/24, 9:34 AM
Housing and rent say otherwise
by PeterStuer on 12/5/24, 10:08 AM
Why does America still have anything that resembles an economy??
Two word answer: reserve currency
by PittleyDunkin on 12/5/24, 3:31 AM
I realize we must reason in terms of states, but the real players make moves that states will go iut of their way to avoid recognizing. We MUST move beyond states and into mayor holders of capital as primary entities of meaning in this world. The state's peak was sometime between 1995 and 2005.
by yabatopia on 12/5/24, 4:26 AM
Oh boy, here we go again. It's like the pre-2008 financial crisis all over again.
Growth is nice, but one look at the debt charts (public debt, credit card debt, car debt, mortgages, student loans, ...) and the trends in defaults and you know what's coming. Add the upcoming tariff plans and the gutting of financial regulations and consumer protection in the mix and you start asking yourself: in 10 years time, will we talk about the financial crisis of 2025 or 2026?
by dependsontheq on 12/5/24, 7:16 AM
There are only a few factors driving this and they are very hard for Europe to solve: - the Bay Area an industrial cluster not comparable to anything we had before due to the scalability and the capital requirements of the products - the US market, the most powerful consumer market in history allowing massive economies of scale at companies, companies can work with a much higher productivity level - capital markets that can finance the most outlandish ideas - better demographics - less crisis and russian intervention (Brexit, Syrian war, Ukraine war are all part of Russias attacks) - bureacracy and regulations are totally overvalued as a factor, definitely something we should solve, but the EU would not be a tech leader without GDPR
by flkenosad on 12/5/24, 11:54 AM
Because they could care less about anything else.
by dathinab on 12/5/24, 1:18 PM
Is "Americas's economy" soaring or "Americas top .1%s economy" soaring?
Because as someone not from the US it often looks a lot (a very big lot) like that in recent year most economical growth exclusively went to a very small minority of US citizens but not the US as a whole.
Like wasn't people economically struggling while the Democrats claiming everything is fine 'cause look economy is growing one of the more believable reasons of people not voting for Democrats (!= voting for Trump)???
by laidoffamazon on 12/5/24, 3:41 AM
And yet, exit polls said ~67% thought the economy was in bad shape.
I tend to agree with the objective data showing economic strength here. I think a big cross section of the country was just struck by nothing less than a mania.
by bookofjoe on 12/4/24, 6:23 PM
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42311318
by hnpolicestate on 12/5/24, 1:13 PM
Let them eat cake.
by indulona on 12/4/24, 11:28 PM
because of uncontrolled money printing, duh.
by bugtodiffer on 12/5/24, 4:48 PM
is it? x'D
by corimaith on 12/5/24, 4:06 PM
I see the economic conspiracy theorists are on a field day here...
by pelorat on 12/5/24, 9:07 AM
Us Europeans are more 'detached' from the economy than people are in the USA. We basically coast along. We don't live on credit, but debit, and most people have zero investments outside their house. We're content and risk adverse and don't care much for the stock market (even though many people's pensions are tied to it).
In places where higher education is cheap, or even sometimes free (like Sweden), there's less pressure to perform after graduation. It's quite common to study some field, but after graduation you go do something completely unrelated. A degree is just a means to an end, something to put on your CV to get an edge over those that does not have a degree. Those who study for the purpose of using their knowledge to create a successful business are very few.
And when it comes to starting a business, the EU market is rarely the target, instead the focus is the domestic and much smaller market.
It's also difficult to start a company that targets a larger market from the get go, because it means you need to advertise in multiple countries, target different languages, set up offices and contacts, and all of that costs money that startups do not have.
The EU single market is largely a myth from the perspective of wanting to start a successful company that can compete internationally. It's not any easier now than it was before the EU existed.
The EU is still a collection of different countries, with different languages, and the people in one country doesn't really care about what happens across their border or which new and up-and-coming company they have to offer.
EU citizens like American companies, because we here about them on the news constantly, but we are completely oblivious to companies from our European neighbors.
by goodpoint on 12/5/24, 8:23 AM
"rivals"?!
by luizfzs on 12/4/24, 8:49 PM
But is the majority of the population thriving?
It is very misleading (at best) to say the economy is strong when a good chunk of the population live paycheck to paycheck.
A handful of companies are thriving, but barely any of its employees.
by forth_throwaway on 12/4/24, 7:09 PM
> Anecdote of shitty AI company raising a fuckton of money
> Mention of GDP with no other metrics
> No mention of inflation
> No mention of QE
> No mention of interest rates
This is propaganda. When your central banks control the world's reserve currency it's pretty easy to make sure that the line goes up every year. The British Empire didn't have their wealth because of their superior system, they got it from imperialism.
Before you downvote please just reflect on what I'm saying a little bit. Do the changes you see on the ground reflect this narrative of economic growth? I see a little bit locally, mostly from the CHIPS act and infrastructure acts, but it doesn't correlate with an improvement in QOL and certainly infrastructure projects are not unique to American capitalism.
by talkingtab on 12/5/24, 3:29 PM
This is corporate propaganda. A corporate take on America based on stories that are atypical. The US is a country where the stock market is soaring while more and more people are not paid a living wage, are homeless and cannot obtain fundamental health care. FT is a written for and read by those fewer and fewer people who benefit benefit from this situation. As tech people we are often the beneficiaries of the ever growing disparity between the haves and have-nots, so we do not want hear or think about where this road leads us. Not a good place folks.
America has given free reign to Corporations with United vs FEC. The preamble to the constitution now reads "We the Corporations of the United States".
by ricksunny on 12/5/24, 3:39 PM
What does ‘soaring’ mean? Are economies ‘rivals’ to each other? Are we in a race? Where is the finish-line?
Thank god for this instructiveness of this headline for remediating the apparent deficency of the economics classes I took in university and in business school. /s
The business press makes me want to gag sometimes, and trims our mindset to keep us plebes in an unnecessarily competitive mindset with respect to each other. Who do you think benefits from this narrative? What are FT’s interests here? Subscriber revenue? Ad revenue? What are the interests of those stakeholders?
by shiroiushi on 12/4/24, 6:32 AM
The US is a great place to make a lot of money if you're lucky and successful, but a terrible place to retire.
by ysofunny on 12/4/24, 7:04 PM
when you control the measuring stick (USA dollar)
you'll always be the tallest of them all
by theowwnanan on 12/4/24, 11:11 PM
Keeping stock market healthy is good for all
by DataDaemon on 12/4/24, 9:36 AM
You are so lucky to be born in the USA:
- Easy to do business - Great economy, high salaries, and funding - English native speaker, so you can speak with everyone and everyone can speak with you
The EU is in a deep hole, with socialism and green communism next.
by piker on 12/5/24, 12:50 PM
My experience as a expat in London is that new things aren’t really being built in Europe today, and that fact is greenwashed over to keep the people here from recognizing how miserable the infrastructure and housing are compared to modern North American counterparts.
by gigel82 on 12/4/24, 8:58 PM
All these statements about the "booming economy" are triggering for a lot of people because this "economy" they're talking about is just an abstract notion that has absolutely nothing to do with people's financial situation.
I don't know if we need a different term entirely to make this distinction.