Something seems out of wack here. 75% of our economy is consumer based and it is up tremendously for last qtr, yet consumer confidence is donw 5 months in a row, lowest since 2008.
Plus last qtr had gov shutdown. So all these consumers that are pessimistic about the future were buying up everything they could when they were worried about the future is how I read it? Makes no sense to me, maybe someone can explain it.
How is GDP up 4.3% when consumer confidence is down for 5th straight month!?
byu/oldmaninparadise ineconomy
Posted by oldmaninparadise
30 Comments
There is something very suspicious about the GDP growth cited. There’s no way to know how and how much the numbers were fucked with (but it’s certain they have been), at least in the short term. I would also expect the circus that is AI and Nvidia’s adventures in circular transactions is having an effect, but it’s not reasonable to pin the GDP growth on that alone. There’s some chance the numbers will be revised in the new year, that’s not uncommon, and it might end up being close to the reality. I suspect, though, given the political climate, that we’ll never really be sure.
They are made up numbers. They fire the people that report the real numbers and replace them with yes men that do what they want them to do. Haven’t you learned you can’t trust anything that this administration is trying to feed you by now?
I would bet a portion of it is the AI build out and the increase in productivity
Most consumer spending was in services. Meaning high income consumers. Plus the AI investment. Without that, private investment is negative. So k shaped economy.
Consumer confidence is just emotional bullshit! The consumer is easily tricked into thinking the sky is falling, look at all the doomers on Reddit. The thing is the consumer is saying one thing and doing another. The prove of that is EPS quarterly reports. Consumer is spending is not debatable like consumer confidence and sentiment reports and polls, its DATA. The only thing out of wack is peoples emotions. Stop listening to the noise, looks at the data! Oh and just remember fearful people spend more at least that what the data says.
Now you missed “How is GDP 4.3% and unemployment is raising.” Simple. Productivity is also rising. Unemployment has ticked up since 2023 but gdp keeps growing meaning productivity is rising. This is the first signs AI is increasing productivity. Even if it’s only writing simple emails or researching topics, it’s still increasing productivity and that’s just the beginning.
Bc they’re cooking the books and excluding the stuff they dont want. Anything can be made to look nice if you get to exclude bad data points.
1). Healthcare spending went through the roof
– why?
Because a ton of people are about to lose their health insurance.
2). A ton of people bought electric cars
– why?
Because tax credits are going away
The numbers were from Q3. The shutdown occurred in Q4. Prices are up due to tariffs reducing imports and increasing costs domestically. Wealthier consumers continue to spend while the rest of Americans are tightening their purse strings.
They removed import numbers from the GDP calculation by using tariffs to lower the imports. This temporary makes the GDP look good until the rest catches up. This is what the Ronald Reagan address on “patriotic tariffs” was talking about.
Because the vakue of the dollar is down.
There’s more money around, but you can buy less with it.
Dude….the US is now China where it comes to economic releases….if you haven’t figured that out, don’t know what to tell ya.
New chefs in the kitchen cooking up bullshit.
Inflation.
Because prices are up overall, it LOOKS like we are spending more.
It sure seems like the S&L crisis in the 90’s.
The S&L’s were selling bad loans back and forth to each other to juice the numbers. The numbers looked good. An essentially worthless property just kept appreciating based on the transactions.
Eventually, there comes a day of reckoning, and it all comes crashing down.
Buying your own chips with your own money counts towards GDP… Silliness.
BS number i think
One time benefit could be substitute american good for foreign good
Foreign good is net zero for GDP… C up.$1m…… M up $1M.. They net..
Consumers confidence statistics weigh all consumers equally, gdp does not.
Fake numbers. Only news demented grandpa likes will be reported in future in the US.
From the cheap infomercials grifter that gave us Trump Steaks and Trump University, here comes Trump GDP!
Some consumers are much more confident and consume much more than the majority.
Inflation drives GDP so when food cost more the GDP also goes up.
When people put food on their credit card and can’t pay i would say Trumps economy isn’t so great..
It helps to remember that Donald J Trump might very well be the most well documented liar in the history of the human race.
The rich are spending their free Trumpbucks to own everything the middle class used to own like homes, and the AI bubble has not burst yet.
Without the BS spending on AI, we would be in a deep recession.
1. You can’t trust any number coming from Gov’t sources anymore; 2. GDP is a terrible metric on the state of the economy. You want to know how the “real economy” is doing? Talk to people.
K shaped economy
Consumer confidence surveys have been garbage for some time. Doesn’t mean much of anything at this point.
I would explain it but I was banned from the r/inflation sub for saying GDP was 4.3%. Lot of upset users on the “economic” subs right now since the data doesn’t fit the end of the world expectation.
no cred. only maybees
Doesn’t help that the value of the dollar is down 11.5% when compared to the Euro.