Thursday, May 14, 2020

How's The Economy Doing?

Stonks – CUCU Covers

How is the economy doing? Not the slightest clue. I just realized the other day that I don't have an inkling of what it means if the economy is doing good or bad. We sure hear it a lot, but what does it actually mean? I don't know the answer, I'm asking you. 

People are saying that the economy is going to go to shit if we don't open up the country. Ok, but how do you know when the economy is shit? What's the gauge? Like is it gas prices? Is that how you know? I feel like unemployment is probably a pretty good indicator, but it's not like I keep up with that. I can tell you what Gio Urshela's batting average was for the Yankees last year, but if you asked me what the unemployment rate was? No clue. Sorry if that makes me a bad person. The other day a friend told me that unemployment is at 14% and I said "Hey not bad". Not the answer he was looking for.   

I can pick it up in conversations from real adults if the economy is doing good or bad. Then I regurgitate it to impress people. I killed it in 2008. When houses were bad or whatever I'd casually slip into conversations, "yeah that was before the economy went to shit" and get a lot of acknowledging nods. But I don't know what that means. All I know about the economy is that there is macro and micro, only because everyone had that one accounting friend in college who loved throwing their little abbreviations around. 

Gun to my head, if you asked how the Great Depression happened, I'd say the stock market crashed. If you followed up with what does that mean, I'd just stare at you and try to listen for the gunshot.

All I'm saying is that proclaiming the economy is doing good/bad is a very blanket statement. I live in stats. Give me something I can work with. Like say we expect this many people to lose their jobs, or something that costs this much is going to cost that much, and other shit like that. I ran out of hypothetical stats, but you get the point. If you want me to learn how the economy works make a fantasy league out of it. Wait....is that what the stock market is? 
  

No comments:

Post a Comment