“Grocery prices are proof that Biden’s economy has created a dystopian hellscape in America” is a relentless talking point on right wing platforms. It’s easy to see why. They have nothing else to hammer re: the economy that resonates with low-info voters. “Jesus Christ, have you seen the price of corn flakes?”
My brother is a leading indicator of what’s percolating in the crazy right bubbles. When I see him going off on some topic over and over on FB (“What the fuck is your sudden problem with electric cars?” I might think, using another example), I know that the current bogeyman is emerging and gaining traction.
He is or has been outraged over tuition forgiveness, puberty blockers, illegal immigration, “senile Joe gutting the second amendment,” CRT, et.al., all wedge issues that have zero impact on him directly. Literally zero.
Russian troll farms and evil righties know how easy it is to rile up this cohort with bad info. So they do.
ETA: Don’t know what we do about closed info systems where we’re not welcome. I guess the good guys need to be as relentless in challenging the bullshit, for purposes of convincing the fence sitters. IMO, the far right guys are a lost cause, and our only strategy can be to outnumber them.
No, that’s not a premise, it’s an obvious inference that I am asking you whether you can acknowledge. When people believe a fact that is the polar opposite of reality, and much of the most popular media is spreading exactly those false facts, doesn’t it seem likely to you that they got those false beliefs from that media?
Right, but with unemployment at a record low, we would expect the net effect of millions of personal anecdotes to be positive, right?
Plus, ask people about jobs under Trump (you don’t even have to say “excluding the pandemic” as the media has given him a mulligan on that). Most people on both sides of the spectrum will say unemployment was low. Even though it was higher then than it is now.
If people are just going by what they see in their everyday lives, how do you explain that?
No, it’s not. I’ve linked to a column making the same points. You’re seemingly just hung up on starting from this point.
You’ve yet to define “false facts” (misinformation) and are now casting it over “most of the popular media”. What does that mean? Are you saying that CNN, NYT, WaPo, etc are all reporting that unemployment is at an all time high? Can you link to examples of popular media reporting false figures about unemployment and that we’re in a recession since you keep insisting that this is where people get this information?
No, for reasons previously mentioned, most notably that people tend to give negative anecdotes rather than positive ones for various psychological/social reasons.
So I’m guessing you can’t link to examples of popular media reporting false figures about unemployment and that we’re in a recession since you keep insisting that this is where people get this information? Or define what you actually mean by “misinformation” so we can discuss it directly instead of relying on it as a vague nebulous term for things you’re sure are the cause.
“Popular media” is probably too imprecise a term for what you’re trying to convey. I trust you don’t mean “old line pre-Internet sources like network television news, CNN, Fox, major newspapers, etc.”
You were meaning more “21st century media, online-only news, podcasts, YouTube, Twitter, SOCIAL media, etc.”, right?
Biden sez “6.5 million jobs in a year, most evah!”
NYT: “Yo, data has only been tallied by government since 1939!”
However, this is flat out wrong, as the community notes state. This data, especially population data, has been collected by the government since 1800, and there are plenty of learned estimates in the literature re: job growth by year. To say there is no data prior to 1939 is disingenuous at best, a lie at worse.
In addition, the US economy prior to 1939 was not large enough to generate 6.5 million new jobs. Of the 65.7 million working aged population of that year, the country’s businesses and governments employed 52 million souls.
For 6.5 million to join the workforce, the number of available jobs would have to increase by 12.5%, and workforce participation to jump from 79.1% to 89%, a figure we haven’t seen since around 1904.
Therefore, it doesn’t matter if this data was collected prior to 1939 or not.
It’s a flatout lie to support a false implication.
Yes, new media mostly but of course I would include FOX too. They were (are?) the number one cable news show. It’s weird that they are often excluded from MSM.
And Sinclair, which runs a lot of local news.
Of course the argument will often be that viewership is in the single digit percent or whatever. But that’s at any one time, plus then you have word of mouth, so their reach and social influence is much, much more than that.
But yes, the combination of cable and online nonsense factories.
Here’s a NYT economics reporter telling an actual economist that the data doesn’t matter, especially for the youth who have had bad vibes since 2019:
For another cite, at 11 minutes in, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman notes that he constantly gets questioned by NYT editors whenever he mentions how good the Biden economy is:
Point taken re: Fox News. They don’t usually fabricate information counter to publicly-released official data, but of course their game is usually spin and selective emphasis.
I forgot about the local-level broadcast outlets owned by Sinclair. They could well be amplifying bad info, especially if there is a grain of truth at the local level (e.g. “Paducah-area unemployment outpaces national average for 8th straight month!”).
I went and looked at what One America News was saying about unemployment right now. I don’t have ad-blockers and I didn’t want to dig around on their site and get a bunch of spam mail and such … but it’s easy to use Google search as a buffer between my cache and “pushy” websites. If you search “One America News, tag, unemployment”, recent articles like the one below are readily turned up.
Here’s how Fox News plays the game. EDIT: Same approach as with “crime!” - make a local news piece look like something that’s happening nationwide and affecting everyone.
“A major jeweler claims the pandemic may have prevented people from meeting their future fiancés, cutting demand for engagement rings. Inflation and anxiety among shoppers haven’t helped.”
From the Bureau of Economic Analysis table linked above, we find inflation-adjusted jewelry sales to have had the following run since Q1 2019 (row 64 for those who want to follow along, in millions of dollars):
2019
Q1: 58,404
Q2: 57,761
Q3: 60,274
Q4: 59,968
2020
Q1: 46,336
Q2: 68,889
Q3: 70,114
Q4: 72,877
2021
Q1: 72,877
Q2: 75,523
Q3: 76,967
Q4: 82,304
2022
Q1: 81,971
Q2: 81,237
Q3: 78,489
Q4: 74,518
2023
Q1: 73,154
Q2: 72,060
Q3: 72,903
Q4: 75,466
(For those asking, “Chained Dollars” is a measure of inflation which takes into account modifications in consumer behavior in response to changes in prices.)
I mean, the story is pretty obvious. In 2019, demand was about $46b in today’s dollars. COVID reduced demand in the first half (especially Q1) of 2020, but the quantity of jewelry purchases skyrocketed from their 2019 levels, representing a $82 billion dollar market by December 2021.
By Q1 of 2023, the latest data available for the article, jewelry sales were down from their Q4 2021 highs, but still much higher than anything pre-pandemic.
This isn’t difficult: COVID depressed sales, then they not only rebounded, they hit record levels in 2021 - pent up demand was some of it, COVID savings was some of it, and, of course, new couples being formed, as always. However, the market cooled a bit because the conditions required for the peak had passed, and yet nowhere… nowhere… does the NYT even hint that this obvious piece of corporate propaganda by Signet might not be supported by market data and, perhaps, Signet is just spinning a bunch of shit to explain why they missed the biggest three-year boom in their industry’s history.
But, no, the NYT accepts Signet’s framing and cannot be assed-bothered to do the sort of research it takes to make a Sunday afternoon post on some random message board to see if the company is just covering their asses, or honestly reporting on actual trends.
And it’s not that they are out-and-out lying, their framing however, is set to fulfill an agenda, and that agenda is to sell newspapers via the same sort of negative tone and ignorance of the data which gets people arguing (engagement) on Facebook… and the SDMB.
I see why you say “spin and selective emphasis” but I think that really flatters them though.
For example, one of the most frequent recurring pieces on FOX right now is the “migrant crime wave”. Even though crime, particularly violent crime, is exceedingly low right now, and falling, and migrants commit crime at a lower rate than those born in America.
So even if there are no specific facts in such segments that are outright false (and that’s a big *if*; I probably made Mr Politifact choke on his coffee), the premise is a lie, and bringing this recurrent segment in the first place is intentionally misleading.
On the economy, FOX has been talking about how disastrous the economy is since Biden took office. Only in recent months, after having to report on month after month of amazing job reports have hosts like Maria Bartiromo started to admit the truth but say it must be because businesses believe Trump will win the election.
But there are plenty of hosts still talking about how bad the economy is, not just inflation but in general. Here are a couple recent examples:
I think we may be talking about different voters here. Of course anyone who watches Fox News is going to think the economy is crashing even if it is raining money from the sky. I fully expect Republicans to have a very negative view of the economy. If Biden was hovering around 50% approval, with all Republicans thinking things were terrible, and Democrats thinking things were good, then I think he would be doing just fine and have a very good chance of winning.
Biden is not at 50% though He is more like 35% approval. So when I interpret the question of Biden not getting more traction, I think it is a question of why he isn’t getting more traction with Democrats and traditional pro-Democrat demographics. If Biden gets 70% of the youth or minorities that is an absolute disaster for him and he will lose in November. If you listen to these groups of people at all, you can tell that they absolutely do not think the economy is good for them. Some for very valid reasons and some less so. Social media is an amplifier particularly on negativity (things are even worse than you thought), but I don’t think it is the main driver here
I agree with your overall post. My point was fairly narrow – that Fox News won’t fabricate an official release from, say, a federal agency.
Example: If the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics comes with a report that says “U.S. unemployment was at 3.7% in May”, Fox wouldn’t report that “according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. unemployment was at 10% in May”.
Otherwise, your entire post is right on about how tiny seeds of truth can yield sprawling lies.
