it's clear that at least half all American voters don't understand technical definitions or explanations (this was Obama's problem too). "Drill Baby Drill", "Lock her up", and "cheap gas" is about their comprehension level.
Emotions are much stronger.
Inflation was uneven. It impacted prices but not wages or savings. It reduced citizen wealth directly and transferred it to corporations and the already wealthy.
They wanted to publicize the problem but not actually take the cure. Now they have zero mandate in any institution. That's what selling out your base gets you.
Most of Hacker News doesn't run in social circles where people are clipping coupons and going to several different stores to shop the best deals just so they can afford to eat that month, but for nearly forty million Americans who receive SNAP benefits (read that number again and let it really sink in), that's their reality. The administration looked either out of touch or even spiteful by doing a one dollar benefits increase to account for the past twelve months of inflation. I'm sure there are plenty of other similar things that are hurting the working poor that are invisible to those spewing scorn at voters who weren't concerned more about wars around the world and luxury beliefs.
No one I've pointed this out to has been able to empathize with these people yet, most coming up with glib replies about how everything for those voters will be even worse now that the other candidate won. Until they can understand the plight of the people who received that one dollar increase and why it was so psychologically devastating to them the month before the election, they'll never understand why their candidate lost. Instead they'll keep pointing to GDP, the low employment numbers made possible by people working multiple jobs to survive, and how great things are for the wealthy instead of trying to actually get in touch with the daily lives of those they rarely interact with. Maybe insulting these people and calling them stupid and evil a few more times will be what finally makes them forget about their food insecurity.
Indeed, it's 41.2 million out of a total of 334.9 million U.S.-Americans, or 12.3 % or more than one in ten folks - that this is more than one in hundred suprised me because the US are by some counts the "richest" country on the planet.
It's merely the country with the richest few, perhaps this calculation is just a way to show statistically what many believed all along, namely that the so-called "American dream" is a pipe dream for most, in the sense that the majority of people simply fund a tiny fews success in the way lottery ticket buyers fund a few select millionaires that don't deserve it.
Here are the yearly trends showing food stamps from 1985 to 2020, I don't know why 21, 22 and 23 data is not shown.
Since the 1985 until 2008, the number of people on benefits stayed roughly around 25 million. In the same time period, US population grew from 220M to 300M, roughly 1% every year.
From 2008 to 2013, the number of people on SNAP roughly doubled to peak at 47.54M people. Population growth was 300M to 315M.
2019 was the lowest point in recent history of only 35.29M people on SNAP, with population growth from 315M to 330M.
I averaged the monthly data from 2021 onward and got 2021: 41.6M, 2022: 41.2M, 2023: 42.1 and 2024 through July: 41.6M
For a long time, poverty in the US was shrinking as a percent of the population. 2008 reversed that trend with things starting to get better after 2013 and really accelerating up until 2019. It's been flat since the post Covid growth.
So everyone saying; "economy is back to normal, we have recovered." there have been 5M people who don't feel it.
This is not the actual increase of the benefit amount. In particular, it appears the cost of living adjustment this year is 2.5%. I have been unable to find statistics on how many people/households actually receive the maximum amount, but I don't have a particular reason to believe it is large. (The average benefit amounts are significantly below the maxima.)
Tldr: the average SNAP benefit amount received by people has increased and will increase by significantly more than $1/month.
Here is something I saw on Bluesky, where all the good people are:
"To all the misgueded twits who ignored every red flag, caved to your worst selves, and bought into all of the most obvious of Trump's insane lies: Everything that happens from here on out. The family members you lose, the suffering, the confiscation of your freedoms of at the whim of your dictator. It's all on you. You can no longer falsely blame dems, antifa, lgbtq, or immigrants for everything you set into motion with your prejudice and cowardice"
It goes on like that, and ends with
"Hope it was all worth it, you hateful fuckwits. Enjoy the ride"
That's just the most widely shared and liked on I happened to be shown by Bluesky, I've seen this repeated in individual comments in many variations. Basically, "at least we'll burn together and it'll be your fault."
> they'll never understand why their candidate lost. Instead they'll keep pointing to GDP, the low employment numbers made possible by people working multiple jobs to survive, and how great things are for the wealthy instead of trying to actually get in touch with the daily lives of those they rarely interact with.
as Cenk Uygur said here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3j7m0tbZJgE
So she put out some good things in the beginning, and we were excited about it. She had some economic populist policies about housing and price gouging etc. [..] She then turns around and sends Mark Cuban all over CNBC to go, remember, I love business interests. [..] She's never going to do the price gouging plan. They swear up and down on CNBC and all over cable news. Well, then she lost her lead. Why do you think you're getting the lead, why do you think you lost the lead? No, they'll never figure it out.
I don't think that's as obvious as Cenk seems to believe it is.
Right, because how do you empathize with someone who gets $1, and their response is: Oh yeah? Well fine then I'm going to vote for the person who wants to take away literally EVERYTHING to show you!
It is the definition of cutting off your head to spite your body.
I completely understand and empathize with someone on SNAP not getting what they need to cover the insane pricing increases we saw greedy corporations force upon all of us and wanting that rectified. But if your solution to that is to either not vote at all, or intentionally vote for the guy who has literally told you his plan is to gut all social services... I'm not sure what to tell you beyond whatever empathy I DID have for you is gone and enjoy sleeping in the bed you just made for yourself. I, and most of the folks on HN are going to be perfectly fine. Those folks that were on SNAP? Good luck...
Consider how the program actually works. You have a job and pay taxes, but don't make much money, so the government takes the taxes you paid and gives them back to you. But you have to apply for the program, and then spend the money (which was originally yours) on only the things they tell you to. And there is more than one assistance program so you have to apply to them each individually. Then each of the programs have their own phase outs if you make more money, but the phase out rates combine to a very high de facto marginal tax rate, which means if you're still struggling you can't get out of it by working some extra hours because that just causes you to lose your benefits. It's a poverty trap.
Then prices go up by 20% or more, but you still can't make any more money or you lose your benefits. In response your benefits are increased by one dollar.
Are people even wrong to want to blow all of that up and replace it with a tax credit?
BTW empathy is when you can feel for those you don't relate to/have attachment to. Empathy is when you make a genuine effort to understand and connect, even across differences. It's not a concept only for people you already relate to.
Or you can be a D-leaning voter who sees D only rising to the level of a less-awful version of putting rich people before you, and you want to discipline D for taking all the D-leaning votes for granted, rather than earning them by being effective on your behalf.
Or you can be an R-leaning voter who sees both R and D as putting rich people before them, and then D goes and adds insult to injury with some stunt, but at least this one R candidate sounds like they might make things better. (Helped along by a lot of disinformation, as well as being alienated by D voters in general. You see many D voters as a bunch of elitists who're benefiting more than you, and are screwing you, while they pick causes or other people to favor that you think are stupid and unfair.)
Years ago, I was horrified, the first time I heard a D-leaning college student tell me they weren't voting D, to discipline D, in a very important election. My first thought was that this sounded like some revolutionary-till-graduation thing, which probably sounded better in their head, but now I sorta see.
Having seen a few elections and administrations since then, with D consistently seeming not to earn the votes of people, I've come around to understanding, even if I don't full agree. If many people either go out of their way to discipline D, or simply can't be bothered to go to the polls, IMHO, it's hard to blame them.
A bit similar with R voters.
We're all being served poop sandwiches, who aren't working for us, and we are desperate or depleted.
If people never have a shot at redemption, why would they ever try to redeem themselves?
And mind, the whole campaign was based on "Trump is worse". That is also hardly ignoring someone.
That's not what I meant by "getting away from them". It's just like Germany in the 1930s: the smart people got out and moved somewhere else before the SHTF. It's the same thing I did: I left the USA. I don't see things getting any better there in my lifetime, and I didn't want to be around the angry MAGA people, so I left.
I don't mean this as finger-wagging at you or anyone; it's so easy to tell people to stay and fight somewhere where you're not. The Nazis could have prevented early on, later on staying couldn't really change anything, it was just another life destroyed in the maw. So yes, good on those who got out. But also good on those who stayed and fought. Personally, as much as I would love to run away from my own country sometimes, I know that wherever I end in, I will have even less influence than here, as infinitely little influence as that may be. And wherever I'd end up, it would just be an even smaller ship in the same rough waters that seem to be engulfing the world.
In the case of the US, it's arguably the most powerful country that is still somewhat free. The Nazis were stopped in a world war, which they started with no real need. If they hadn't started the war, or if they had won it, or if there hadn't been any other power that isn't also totalitarian that could have conceivably challenged them -- as is the case with the US -- then they might still be in power.
It was close enough back then, if the US falls into that hole, with all the weapon and surveillance tech that exists today, I just don't see any "outside" that could help, or be safe. There could be countries poor enough in resources that get left alone long for me to get old in them, at best, but should I have children, they'd be be up for grabs by whatever is being cooked now. That's basically why I even care about US politics as non-American. When that particular tower falls, it might blot out the sun. If not forever, then for long enough that it simply must never be found out IMO.
Sorry I didn't mean to be this dark, but I mulled this stuff over so much, and this is what I think about it, what I can't help but think about it.
I got tired of dealing with that, and found a society I enjoyed living in much more, so I found a job there and moved there. If someone wants to stay in the US and try to make it better, more power to them, and I hope they succeed. I'm not that young any more and just want to live in a nice place, and the US was no longer that place (and, in my view, stopped being that place around 2000).
Point is, business, markets and consumers vote their interests. Look at Wall Street, Bitcoin, &c. in the hours leading up to the election.
I dunno if this is price gouging or restaurants genuinely are paying more for their supplies. End result is the same, I am paying more if I eat out.
Yes, this is anecdotal. Yes I know I should probably eat at home. I’m just saying this to show that stock markets, GDP etc doesn’t matter if people are stressed while buying groceries or having a meal at a local restaurant. None of the fancy infographics matters if I am starving
At the very least we would have avoided this incredibly damaging narrative about the stolen election. And there's a chance that the country would be less polarized than it is now.
Trump is very serious about tariffs, and the president has more unilateral authority in this arena than folks realize, he wouldn't even need an act of congress to do alot in this arena
The Dems didn't really have an inroad to that demographic. Suggesting federally granted home buying credits just sounded like another financial scheme from on high and missed the mark entirely imho; there was no bigger economic discussion happening there.
AKA: we figured out how to pass a consumption tax which disproportionately hurts poor people without calling it that because we know it's universally unpopular. When billionaires effective tax rate drops to what will probably be 1%, the wheels are going to REALLY fall off.
Somehow that does not compute.
During which presidency did prices go up more? During Trump's last "Tariff" presidency or during the supposed anti-Tariff Biden?
"Watch videos of" is why we're banning TikTok. Just kidding. Or maybe not. I can find stupid people in any camp (well, in some more than others) and make a video about how clueless they are. It's super patronizing to just say your opponents are stupid and IMO one of the reasons why the democrats lost these elections (no shortage of other reasons).
The delusions don't stop at any demographic or party unfortunately. We just live in a post truth, post civil discussion, polarized, society.
What’s so hard to understand about that?
IME they're a diverse group who all bought some just-so stories explaining why life was so much better 4yo. Rose tinted glasses and a repeated call to look to the past to some idealized time that never existed.
All that reinforced by a lot of loud distractions to avoid the awkward fact that the pandemic was a disaster, the tax cuts ballooned the deficit more than Biden, benefited mostly the rich, insiders lining their pockets, racking up pardons, and foreign policy that was openly corrupt.
Not arguing that the carbon tax is legit. It hasn't been proven yet that it isn't just a way to collect money while pretending to do something about the environment.
We should maybe just reconsider in general what kind of thing is economically viable
Why would he not? It's not like he respects institutions such as the Supreme Court. And what repercussions has he ever faced for the destruction of norms and guardrails? If anything, he gains even more support.
Damn whoever used that “may you live in interesting times” curse once to many times.
Total US spending on all defense, not just NATO, is ~$900 billion or ~13-14% of federal spending. NATO has a total annual budget of less than $4 billion and we cover something like 15% of that budget, less than 0.001% of military spending and some infinitesimal portion of overall spend.
> for nothing in return
The US gains incomparable wealth from controlling the global prime currency. Part of the enforcement of this primacy is 750 military bases in 80 countries, giving the US a force projection capability greater than any empire in human history. For the US, NATO is just a just an organizational tool to manage resources among it's allies.
All your tax dollars? How much do you think the US spends on defense without giving anything to NATO? Do you think that’ll somehow decrease if you leave NATO? It just means you’ll have to handle everything yourself. At least currently the US gets to charter about half of all their craft from various European allies.
> if the norms mean giving all of our tax dollars to NATO for nothing in return
We do not give our tax dollars to NATO, at least not in any meaningful way. NATO's entire budget as an organization is about $4B/year, which includes valuable shared command/control systems. For the most part, we fund the American military, and we commit to using it in concert with our allies in certain scenarios.
In exchange, we get incredibly valuable hard and soft power. We get access to land in Europe to use as bases, which are staging areas for potential worldwide threats (e.g., an imperialist Russia). We get shared intelligence. We get goodwill with the rest of the West, so that they'll join our trade pacts. We get commitments of Polish tanks and British spies and French manpower if there ever to be a hot war, so that the US can focus on what it does best (air and naval superiority).
But also, you're the only one who brought up NATO. There are myriad unrelated norms that Trump broke the first time around, and will certainly break further this time, that make the institution of "the American government" less able to serve its purpose. Norms like, a president can't pardon himself. A president can't use his position to direct foreign powers to patronize his own businesses. A president can't summon a violent mob to Washington to overturn an election. A president can't conspire with state legislatures and militias to disregard the results of their states' elections. A non-sitting president can't steal classified documents, and can't have ongoing secret communications with a foreign power. A president keeps special counsel at arm's reach. A president shouldn't use tax policy to explicitly punish states that don't vote for him.
This article and the source material from the Economist argue that what really happened is Republicans negatively polarized themselves against the economy, and will just say anything in surveys. https://www.econlib.org/why-so-sad/