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I'm frustrated with the nonsense political interpretation of hard financial data, data financial institutions around the planet make their decisions upon. Someone recently responded to my statement, "Employment numbers are up" with the political spin statement, "Only for low paying jobs". Though I haven't seen data to indicate what median salaries in the U.S. are, and I'm pretty certain the person who said "Only for low paying jobs" has no idea either, the fact remains that the unemployment number is a real and accepted number that is used to indicate the health of the economy. One could legitimately argue that people who have been jobless for more than two years fall off the the employment number because they can no longer file for unemployment. One could also legitimately argue that the self employed often 1099 themselves, and therefore are also not represented by the employment number.
In that spirit, I thought I'd conduct my own little non-scientific survey. Are you, as a U.S. citizen, better off today than you were two years ago? Are you better off than you were eight years ago? I ask this question in terms not just of wage, but of net worth and quality life.
Personally, the crash of the Nasdaq 2001 eliminated 90% of my net worth. Outsourcing and globalization destroyed my business about the same time. Given all that, my earnings are higher and my net worth triple what it was prior to 2001. It's been a lot of work recovering, but I enjoy the work so I have to say my quality of life is better as well. My answer would be Yes on all fronts.
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