The Patriot Post® · Bidenflation Hitting Americans Hard
Joe Biden’s policy-induced inflation, which we have termed “Bidenflation,” is hitting American families hard. Even worse, there appears to be no end in sight. This dawning realization has some economists warning of a return to the late 1970s economic condition dubbed “stagflation,” where wages stagnate while inflation jumps.
Recent polling finds that a growing majority of Americans, over 60%, are “very concerned” about the rising rate of inflation, and a spirit of pessimism now dominates their economic outlook. Some 40.4% of voters say they are “worse off” financially today than they were a year ago, which is more than double the percentage who say they are better off.
While perception may be everything in politics, it doesn’t always match reality. In this case, however, the public sentiment is backed up by the data, and that data is not good.
Long gone are the boon years of Trump’s roaring economy, replaced by an economy teetering on stagnation. While there are 11 million jobs available, there are still four million fewer workers in the workforce today than in January of 2020, prior to the COVID pandemic. Why this is the case appears to be mostly due to the overhanded response to the pandemic extended and exacerbated by Biden’s vaccine mandate.
One survey finds that 7 in 10 unvaccinated workers have opted to leave their jobs rather than submit to vaccine mandates and testing. It’s hard to fill jobs when onerous and Liberty-infringing conditions are mandated, especially when the COVID vaccines and masking have proven to do nothing to prevent the spread of the novel virus. Maybe the Supreme Court’s recent ruling against Biden’s OSHA vaccine mandate on 100-plus-employee businesses will help to stop the phenomenon of unvaccinated workers leaving their jobs.
Back to the problem of Bidenflation, even as wages have increased over the last year, the spiking inflation has wiped out wage growth so much so that Americans’ hourly earnings have effectively shrunk by 2.4%. Consumer prices have risen by the largest annual margin (5.5%) since 1991, and core producer prices have risen 8.3%. American households are cutting their spending to cope. For example, some 80% of Americans say they have “cut ties with [their] favorite brands” as a cost-saving measure. This was borne out in the recent data from spending this past Christmas season, when retail sales decreased 1.9% in December.
Major businesses have begun raising prices. Home-goods retailer IKEA raised its prices an average of 9%; fast-food chain Little Caesars raised the price of its Hot-N-Ready pizza for the first time in 25 years; and the Dollar Tree store, famous for selling goods priced at just $1, announced it will be raising the price on many of its items to $1.25.
To put it simply, in Biden’s economy, Americans are finding they are having to pay more for less, which, according to White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, is a “move in a good direction” as she downplayed any concern over the direction of the economy. If the administration continues to maintain that head-in-the-sand attitude, it’ll be in for a rude awaking come the midterms.