Even as inflation continues to cool into the second half of 2024, many Americans say they’re still struggling to make ends meet.
Roughly one-third of U.S. workers say they’re living paycheck to paycheck and have nearly no money for savings after paying their monthly bills, according to a survey from personal finance website Bankrate.
Solutions to inflation:
#1) Wage growth. How do you make more money? Get a new job and move! Problem: Everyone has these golden handcuff mortgages. 2% to 7%. Moving would actually cost people more per month that the extra wages
#2) Wage growth through WFH. This path is currently so crowded that few have a chance. Hopefully once a few office mortgages are done and boomers with office fetishes die, more jobs will move this way
#3) Deflation. Makes economist immediately shout “But people will hold off purchasing things until later, making the economy worse!” The average car age is at a record high. Everyone is holding off on housing. There is word of groceries payment plans on installments. People already are holding off for later.
I say we try 3 until 2 becomes viable.
It’s insane how much time and money we waste on just commuting for jobs that we really don’t need to be travelling to, and additionally how much we waste on just fucking around in the office without actually doing anything productive (because there’s nothing productive to do). A lot of people could free up a whole half of the rest of their life by just being able to work from home, I wager. Whether people realize it or not, the commute (including the gas money and fares) is part of the time they dedicate to work, and having to waste time on it without getting paid means you’re getting lese compensation for your time. Some people don’t value their time enough for it to matter, but some people (like me) do.
If you average 2 hours a day on your commute, that’s almost an entire month of unpaid time you’re using on your job (it’s not 30 days of pure time if you work an average of 4.5 days per week, but I’m including costs associated with the commute like gas or car maintanence and repair, which for most people would bring it up from the original 20 days to at least 30 days). Most people who don’t live in a city (or who have a job a far enough distance away) waste a whole fucking half a month to an entire month every year – 1/24 to 1/12 of their entire life – just driving to work. On the commute alone. I would take a massive pay cut to not have to make that commute, as well as not have to waste time sitting in an office that I could be using with my loved ones or to do the things I enjoy, which a good WFH setup actually allows you to do.
I’m moving to Chicago so I don’t have to have a car nor waste that much time travelling to places, and not just work but also to stores and hobby stuff. Apparently this is something a lot of people have been doing within the past few years because of how affordable Chicago is in comparison to pretty much every other big city. Ahhh, gentrification my beloved.
Overall I think we’re having a massive reversal of suburbanization/white flight and a move back to cities by people who want to “take back” their time and freedom of movement. As well as just generally not wanting to live in a conservative hellhole.