Current events discussion

[ThxOne Premium Member]

Rob, argue all you want. It will not change the fact the America does not agree with you. Please stop telling me what I paid for gas. You do not know what I paid and have never known what I paid. When I tell you that I pay MORE for gas now than when Trump was president it is because me paying over $3 a gallon and sometimes over $4 most of Biden's run is MORE than paying less than $2 a gallon under Trump. I don't care what graphs you pull out of your *** to argue with. Your graphs do not represent what each person pays.

 

[Eggs 5,000+ posts]

 

[RobGMN Premium Member]

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[Eggs 5,000+ posts]

 

[RobGMN Premium Member]

Rob, argue all you want. It will not change the fact the America does not agree with you. Please stop telling me what I paid for gas. You do not know what I paid and have never known what I paid. When I tell you that I pay MORE for gas now than when Trump was president it is because me paying over $3 a gallon and sometimes over $4 most of Biden's run is MORE than paying less than $2 a gallon under Trump. I don't care what graphs you pull out of your *** to argue with. Your graphs do not represent what each person pays.

You are hung up on using beliefs as a measure of things, which doesn't work. 74% of Americans believe in God. That doesn't prove God exists. 14% believe Bigfoot exists. That doesn't make Bigfoot real.
Facts don't care if anyone agrees with them or not. You can disagree all you want that 2+2=4. Hell, you could get 90% of the country to agree with your disagreement, but it doesn't change the mathematical fact that 2+2=4.

I have been arguing nothing but facts all along, and continue to do so, but you immediately launch into your confrontational "I don't care what graphs you pull out of your ***" as if the numbers are made up and your personal belief changes the reality.

So let's argue what is happening and has happened to the country as a whole, not your personal beliefs or microcosm of experiences. Those don't represent what is happening to everyone or even the average person.
The numbers I present are what has actually happened to the average American, which is how our government is supposed to deal with things, and how the economy affects things.

Maybe your income didn't go up in the past 10 years and the price of gas is crushing you. That puts you outside the average. Other people saw a 400% increase in their income, which makes them outliers too. But outliers don't change the average radically, or else they wouldn't be outliers.

There is absolutely no denying the gas price history, and the inflation history in our economy. They are set in stone. Those two datasets show that gas prices have dropped over time, even though they rose at times and fell at times. That's the nature of the beast.
The mathematical fact is that today's national average nominal gas price of $3.08 is pretty damn good when you consider where it has been for the past, and even during the Trump administration (unadjusted prices from $2.25 to $2.75).

If you live in an area where gas was below the $2.25 average that we hit for a few days, then you live in an area where the rest of the local economy matches that price. Affluent areas don't see low gas prices when compared to non-affluent areas. It's just how business works.
For example, in 2022, the median income in Kentucky was $57,000; in California it was $77,000. So in Kentucky you got to pay $1.86 for gas for a day, but California paid $2.25.

Do I know how much you paid per gallon, to the penny? No. But I do know that all gas sold in America gets calculated into the average pricing, and that all gas stations follow the price as it moves nationally and locally. I CAN say that you didn't pay a huge difference from the average. That's just how the math works.

I also know that the average American driver uses 40 gallons a month. If you look at the adjusted pricing, that's a cost of $160 per month under Trump. The chart only goes to 2022, which shows $4.25. That's an increase of $10 PER MONTH comparing 2022 to 2018. A 6% increase over 4 years.

The median wage in America is 10% higher in 2022 than in 2018.
That means gas was actually cheaper to the average American in 2022 than in 2018.
And the nominal price has dropped daily since 2022, which make it even cheaper NOW than in 2022.

Now, you may not be the average American who has seen a wage increase in the past six years. That definitely makes rising prices tougher on you, but that indicates a problem other than the rising prices. And doesn't represent the average American's situation.
It may be cause for introspection as to why you haven't moved forward financially in a way that allows you to stay ahead of your expenses.

 

[RobGMN Premium Member]

Wrong again Rob. Nice try though. However, that was a very childish attempt at trying to redirect blame. LOL...

If you pay attention, you will see that the Republicans continue to be more accepting than others. Haven't you noticed who just won the election? People are realizing how wacked the dems agendas are.

Wrong according to some talking head podcaster? What are her creds to redetermine history?
Can you share them?

Regardless, I am very interested in the plan you think Trump has to just step in and change our economy with the sweep of a pen.
Can you tell me how you think he is going to achieve the things you say he will achieve?

I have to assume that since you truly believe it's going to happen, you have seen some viable and achievable plan for doing so. I can't imagine with your economics acumen that you would simply just believe a claim of "I'm going to do this", like his claim that he will just tell the banks to lower credit card rates.

What's the plan, and how will it be achieved?

 

[Jimi77 Premium Member]

It's interesting that a doubling of the inflation rate "must not be bad" because it happened under Trump, but I guess there must have been some tradeoff that made spending more money better under him than under Biden.
Real gas prices did not see anywhere the surge that people think, and the impact was lessened dramatically by the massive number of people who shifted to remote work, reducing their usage (which offset costs). You were actually paying more for gas in 1998 than now, and about 20 cents more than in 2017.
Gas prices are actually a pretty poor indicator of COL changes, since they just keep getting cheaper over time.
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I know every number ever released on the economy is fake news, but it sure looks like after the recession, wages were outpacing inflation at almost two years to the month after Biden took office.

Inflation was already starting to rise before he took office, then it surged under Biden. Analysis puts the heavy share of it on housing shortages, later driven by supply chain issues as American shifted their spending from services to goods that were suddenly unavailable.
And we know what happens to prices when demand goes up and supply drops.

Two years from almost complete collapse, and wage growth was already outpacing inflation. Terrible job?

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Again, we all know the numbers are all faked, every aspect of border control is doing a shitty job and just sitting around drinking coffee and eating donuts (I'm sure they love to hear how shitty they all are doing), but the fact is that deportations surged under Biden to a level not seen since 2004, while the number of illegal immigrants here didn't see anywhere near the surge that people claim.
Yes, 10% growth is growth, but it's not the millions upon millions of bodies that right-wingers are seeing in their heads, or believing because they saw it in a meme.

A change from what we have seen under Biden would be a reduction in expulsions.
That seems to make the border more open, which will only serve to increase the population of illegals.


View attachment 61138View attachment 61139
usage

I think most people would agree that inflation is highly understated in that chart (I'd argue the whole inflation calculation is designed to understate inflation). I doubt you'll find anybody here that would disagree that groceries are up ~75% since Biden took office. Gas is 2-3x more. Utilities have ~doubled. Housing/rent that was already unaffordable jumped ~25% since Biden took office. I'm not saying it's all Biden's fault, but he's going to pay the price much like Trump had to pay the price for Covid.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

You are hung up on using beliefs as a measure of things, which doesn't work. 74% of Americans believe in God. That doesn't prove God exists. 14% believe Bigfoot exists. That doesn't make Bigfoot real.
Facts don't care if anyone agrees with them or not. You can disagree all you want that 2+2=4. Hell, you could get 90% of the country to agree with your disagreement, but it doesn't change the mathematical fact that 2+2=4.

I have been arguing nothing but facts all along, and continue to do so, but you immediately launch into your confrontational "I don't care what graphs you pull out of your ***" as if the numbers are made up and your personal belief changes the reality.

So let's argue what is happening and has happened to the country as a whole, not your personal beliefs or microcosm of experiences. Those don't represent what is happening to everyone or even the average person.
The numbers I present are what has actually happened to the average American, which is how our government is supposed to deal with things, and how the economy affects things.

Maybe your income didn't go up in the past 10 years and the price of gas is crushing you. That puts you outside the average. Other people saw a 400% increase in their income, which makes them outliers too. But outliers don't change the average radically, or else they wouldn't be outliers.

There is absolutely no denying the gas price history, and the inflation history in our economy. They are set in stone. Those two datasets show that gas prices have dropped over time, even though they rose at times and fell at times. That's the nature of the beast.
The mathematical fact is that today's national average nominal gas price of $3.08 is pretty damn good when you consider where it has been for the past, and even during the Trump administration (unadjusted prices from $2.25 to $2.75).


View attachment 61141

If you live in an area where gas was below the $2.25 average that we hit for a few days, then you live in an area where the rest of the local economy matches that price. Affluent areas don't see low gas prices when compared to non-affluent areas. It's just how business works.
For example, in 2022, the median income in Kentucky was $57,000; in California it was $77,000. So in Kentucky you got to pay $1.86 for gas for a day, but California paid $2.25.

Do I know how much you paid per gallon, to the penny? No. But I do know that all gas sold in America gets calculated into the average pricing, and that all gas stations follow the price as it moves nationally and locally. I CAN say that you didn't pay a huge difference from the average. That's just how the math works.

I also know that the average American driver uses 40 gallons a month. If you look at the adjusted pricing, that's a cost of $160 per month under Trump. The chart only goes to 2022, which shows $4.25. That's an increase of $10 PER MONTH comparing 2022 to 2018. A 6% increase over 4 years.

The median wage in America is 10% higher in 2022 than in 2018.
That means gas was actually cheaper to the average American in 2022 than in 2018.
And the nominal price has dropped daily since 2022, which make it even cheaper NOW than in 2022.

Now, you may not be the average American who has seen a wage increase in the past six years. That definitely makes rising prices tougher on you, but that indicates a problem other than the rising prices. And doesn't represent the average American's situation.
It may be cause for introspection as to why you haven't moved forward financially in a way that allows you to stay ahead of your expenses.

There you go with your national averages again. $4.00 is more than $2.00 no matter how much you want it to be the opposite. I don't live in California and I don't pay their prices. I pay the prices where I live which is not the national average. Do you go to the gas station near you and demand to pay the national average for your gas? No, you don't. All you are doing is over explaining your argument which does not sit well for making people believe you.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

I think most people would agree that inflation is highly understated in that chart (I'd argue the whole inflation calculation is designed to understate inflation). I doubt you'll find anybody here that would disagree that groceries are up ~75% since Biden took office. Gas is 2-3x more. Utilities have ~doubled. Housing/rent that was already unaffordable jumped ~25% since Biden took office. I'm not saying it's all Biden's fault, but he's going to pay the price much like Trump had to pay the price for Covid.

Oh on the contrary. RobGMN thinks we are literally only paying pennies more.

 

[Jimi77 Premium Member]

Yes. The economy is naturally self-correcting unless that correction is collapse, which we try to prevent with all the different measures in place (halting trading on the market, Feds adjusting interest rates, shrinking/expanding money supply, etc).
It (inflation) has been self-correcting since the "post-pandemic" spike, and so have wages (see chart above).

But there are a collective 70 million voices talking about how Trump is going to simply reduce prices when he enters office in January. I'm interested in the details of HOW he is going to do such a thing, but no one seems to be able to answer the question. It's almost like they voted simply on the belief that he will wave the magic wand and we will al get big wage increases, produce all goods in the US for cheaper than imported goods, find enough oil to no longer need imports and thus get gas for a dollar a gallon.

The problem is that you simply can't have all those things. You can't pay a great wage to the widget builder while you sell the widget for nothing. It's a reason the phrase "We're losing a dollar on every widget we sell, but we'll make it up in volume" is a joke.

So, does ANYONE know the how/what/why of the magic spell?

Yes the disincentive to produce. Trump literally cut a "deal" to reduce the oil supply in order to increase prices, by threatening to scrap a 75-year-long strategic alliance with the Saudis.
He did it in order to keep prices higher so our local producers could remain profitable as prices were dropping due to the pandemic. His relationship seems to be more of their fear of our power than of being "buddies".

In effect, gas prices went up so that we could help local industry that was being hurt by a world market.
But if the world market did to us what we did to the world market, we would consider that market our newest mortal enemy.

Ptrodollar is good for us, but can we force the world market to adhere?

There is not a collective 70m voices saying Trump will bring prices down. A lot of people that voted Trump are former liberals/dems. We can look at a chart and see how inflation has been trending for the last year. We don't even need the chart, we can go to the grocery store and see whether or not prices have gone up.

Can we force the world to adhere to the Petrodollar - we have done just that for decades, so the answer is yes and I think Trump is the man that can make that happen. The Saudis, UAE, etc have no confidence in Biden for good reason.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

How about Crypto trends since Trump was elected. I am up 34%!!

 

[Jimi77 Premium Member]

Glad you admit to being a sheep of the media

I don't think that's very fair. Rob has definitely presented data to support his positions. He's not coming on here and just parroting what Rachel Maddow said the night before. As a matter of fact just look at his current string of posts. That's not liberal media talking points right now. The current liberal narrative is the Red vote is just a bunch of white racist, sexist and how can we censure social media.

 

[Old_Slapper]

You are hung up on using beliefs as a measure of things, which doesn't work. 74% of Americans believe in God. That doesn't prove God exists. 14% believe Bigfoot exists. That doesn't make Bigfoot real.
Facts don't care if anyone agrees with them or not. You can disagree all you want that 2+2=4. Hell, you could get 90% of the country to agree with your disagreement, but it doesn't change the mathematical fact that 2+2=4.

I have been arguing nothing but facts all along, and continue to do so, but you immediately launch into your confrontational "I don't care what graphs you pull out of your ***" as if the numbers are made up and your personal belief changes the reality.

So let's argue what is happening and has happened to the country as a whole, not your personal beliefs or microcosm of experiences. Those don't represent what is happening to everyone or even the average person.
The numbers I present are what has actually happened to the average American, which is how our government is supposed to deal with things, and how the economy affects things.

Maybe your income didn't go up in the past 10 years and the price of gas is crushing you. That puts you outside the average. Other people saw a 400% increase in their income, which makes them outliers too. But outliers don't change the average radically, or else they wouldn't be outliers.

There is absolutely no denying the gas price history, and the inflation history in our economy. They are set in stone. Those two datasets show that gas prices have dropped over time, even though they rose at times and fell at times. That's the nature of the beast.
The mathematical fact is that today's national average nominal gas price of $3.08 is pretty damn good when you consider where it has been for the past, and even during the Trump administration (unadjusted prices from $2.25 to $2.75).


View attachment 61141

If you live in an area where gas was below the $2.25 average that we hit for a few days, then you live in an area where the rest of the local economy matches that price. Affluent areas don't see low gas prices when compared to non-affluent areas. It's just how business works.
For example, in 2022, the median income in Kentucky was $57,000; in California it was $77,000. So in Kentucky you got to pay $1.86 for gas for a day, but California paid $2.25.

Do I know how much you paid per gallon, to the penny? No. But I do know that all gas sold in America gets calculated into the average pricing, and that all gas stations follow the price as it moves nationally and locally. I CAN say that you didn't pay a huge difference from the average. That's just how the math works.

I also know that the average American driver uses 40 gallons a month. If you look at the adjusted pricing, that's a cost of $160 per month under Trump. The chart only goes to 2022, which shows $4.25. That's an increase of $10 PER MONTH comparing 2022 to 2018. A 6% increase over 4 years.

The median wage in America is 10% higher in 2022 than in 2018.
That means gas was actually cheaper to the average American in 2022 than in 2018.
And the nominal price has dropped daily since 2022, which make it even cheaper NOW than in 2022.

Now, you may not be the average American who has seen a wage increase in the past six years. That definitely makes rising prices tougher on you, but that indicates a problem other than the rising prices. And doesn't represent the average American's situation.
It may be cause for introspection as to why you haven't moved forward financially in a way that allows you to stay ahead of your expenses.

Again, this goes to show how you are not able to think outside the liberal box. You have no problem pulling stuff out of your butt to discredit the republicans, but you will take everything you hear from a lib as pure gospel.

The libs tell you that due to the rise in inflation, gas prices are lower compared to 2019. Now, this is where I give you another lesson in economics, which you claim to be so knowledgeable in. Inflation and personal are two different measurements. When inflation goes up, personal income does not go up accordingly. By your useless rambling, you stated that it's okay for gas prices to raise 75% because inflation prices make up for the difference. Well, did you get a 75% increase in pay? Did you get a 25% increase in pay? NOPE!!! Therefore, paying $2.50 for gas, when a few years ago you were paying $1.86, will make a bigger chunk out of your check if you were only making 10% more than a few years ago. For your income to keep up with the cost of gas, you would have to be making 25% more, today, than you did in 2019.

I hate not having a mic after these speeches. I guess I'll just drop my keyboard instead.

 

[RobGMN Premium Member]

There you go with your national averages again. $4.00 is more than $2.00 no matter how much you want it to be the opposite. I don't live in California and I don't pay their prices. I pay the prices where I live which is not the national average. Do you go to the gas station near you and demand to pay the national average for your gas? No, you don't. All you are doing is over explaining your argument which does not sit well for making people believe you.

Yes my "national averages again". I was very clear that prices can vary from the national average, but those are not the ONLY thing that can vary. Income varies too.

You live in Kentucky, where gas prices may be lower than the average. But Kentucky is also a place where incomes are lower than the average.

Let's keep it simple: Did your income decrease, increase, or stay the same since 2017?

In Kentucky, incomes went up 12% since 2018 ($54,560 in 2018). That's an average for 2 million people so it means that it happened to MOST of the workers. If it was just a few, they would not affect the average.
Gas in Kentucky bounced the channel from a nominal price of $2.50 up to $3.00, down to $2.30 at the close of the yea0 2018. Filling up weekly gives you an average price for the year in the $2.75 range, as most people don't buy all of their gas in one purchase at either the low or the high point.

Kentucky gas is now at $2.81, 6 years later. So incomes are up 12%, and gas is at where it was.

Yes, it spiked. The chart shows that. But it is also bouncing in a channel that continues to tighten, bringing it within a range the market will bear. That's how capitalism and speculative markets work.

So we're back to the question (for gas at least) of why your income hasn't grown to match the the growth rate of the average Kentuckyan, so that you can continue to afford things as prices inevitably rise.
I had one person very honestly admit to me that they were still making what they made in the late 90's. I told them that it seemed they had just given up at some point, as a working person should strive to do better with every successive year.

Have you made efforts to increase your income every year to keep up with rising prices, or did you think that prices would just hold in place for you (something that hasn't happened in history, AFAIK)?
That is a genuine question.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

Yes my "national averages again". I was very clear that prices can vary from the national average, but those are not the ONLY thing that can vary. Income varies too.

You live in Kentucky, where gas prices may be lower than the average. But Kentucky is also a place where incomes are lower than the average.

Let's keep it simple: Did your income decrease, increase, or stay the same since 2017?

In Kentucky, incomes went up 12% since 2018 ($54,560 in 2018). That's an average for 2 million people so it means that it happened to MOST of the workers. If it was just a few, they would not affect the average.
Gas in Kentucky bounced the channel from a nominal price of $2.50 up to $3.00, down to $2.30 at the close of the yea0 2018. Filling up weekly gives you an average price for the year in the $2.75 range, as most people don't buy all of their gas in one purchase at either the low or the high point.

Kentucky gas is now at $2.81, 6 years later. So incomes are up 12%, and gas is at where it was.

Yes, it spiked. The chart shows that. But it is also bouncing in a channel that continues to tighten, bringing it within a range the market will bear. That's how capitalism and speculative markets work.

So we're back to the question (for gas at least) of why your income hasn't grown to match the the growth rate of the average Kentuckyan, so that you can continue to afford things as prices inevitably rise.
I had one person very honestly admit to me that they were still making what they made in the late 90's. I told them that it seemed they had just given up at some point, as a working person should strive to do better with every successive year.

Have you made efforts to increase your income every year to keep up with rising prices, or did you think that prices would just hold in place for you (something that hasn't happened in history, AFAIK)?
That is a genuine question.



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View attachment 61142

I lived in GA in 2017. So tell me, how do you dictate what your employer will pay you. You speak as if that is what happens. Also, Lexington on average is lower on gas prices than where I live.