After reading this news story that half of Americans are skipping meals because of affordability and a bad economy, I have to ask how are you all doing out there?
I heard from a real estate agent friend of mine that REOs, i.e. bank foreclosures on home mortgages, are going up like crazy, which is a sign of bad times, like the recession of 2007-08.
I have heard from others about rents not being paid, lack of jobs, etc.
Every day, there’s more news of corporate layoffs, moreso than usual.
I live in the economic bubble of the SF Bay Area, where tech wealth more-or-less insulates me and mine from the most serious consequences of a bad economy, but how are things elsewhere?
Vancouver, Canada: People are of course worried about the US having returned to it trying to conquer and subjugate us again, and global warming casts an increasingly looming shadow. But the US utterly failed to split off Alberta, Quebec is showing no interest in it either and Carney is mostly doing a good job so there is still increasing hope.
Gas prices are still punitive in Vancouver, but that has been the case since we stood up for ourselves against having a pipeline to nowhere shoved up our ass, so we’re used to that now. We havent seen the crazy increase other places have other than in diesel because China is buying it all to keep their prices down.
Food prices are only bad if you shop at the big supermarkets. If you shop at farmers markets or small locals, prices have stayed relatively steady.
Job wise market is looking very strong. A few years back, most of the posts I saw were international or fraud reposts, but more and more in the last 18 months have been local growth, with larger compensation as well for the most part.
Those food prices sound interesting. In the UK its the reverse. Farmers markets cost a fortune but Aldi costs fuck all.
We are not being overly frugal with food and it still usually costs under £30/week for 2 of us. If we wanted to be frugal I would probably cut out the meat and cheese to replace with grains which would half our spending.
As an example this weekend: Farmers market organic apples(Braeburn and Honeycrisp), single farm, guy who sold me the apples oversaw their picking this week. $3.50 / pound.
Superstore, US grown Galas, been in a box for 6 months, $3 / pound.
We’re around 60-70 / week for me and my partner four usual food, but that also includes some steak and pork once and a while.