This is a great chart, helpful to stay the course during these seemingly turbulent times.
On this topic, I'm 41, have a young baby, and recently stopped working (possibly FIRE, possibly just taking a break depending on a few factors). It feels like things are particularly bad right now relative to other time periods in the past ~100 years. Though, I'm also trying to be realistic that maybe it's just my age and situation in life that has me feeling this way. Interested in other opinions.
Probably having a baby is the entirety of the cause!
I am always fascinated by this type of take. Apparently nearly two-thirds of the US thinks the economy is failing, yet the stock market is doing well overall and is in a bull market, unemployment is incredibly low, cash earns interest now, and wages are rising.
Sure, housing is tight and mortgage rates "seem" high (recency bias, as they are still near or below historic averages). Some people judge the economy solely on gas prices, somehow forgetting gas prices were higher nearly 20 years ago. Some people still believe inflation is killing us when it's back to historic ranges. My own hunch is there's a deep angst in the zeitgeist because we know we've created a climate crisis and a helpless sense of a ticking clock that's making us all a bit mad, and in the US a fear that the American century is nearing its end and other powers are rising.
You could believe things were "particularly bad" if you pay attention to political theater, but it sure looks to me like people's behavior is saying the exact opposite--they are spending like crazy and still investing. The truth is we're so loaded with biases that we need to look at charts like these to remind us that the world hasn't ended yet despite all the noise. I understand selling doom and fear is a time-tested business model, but you don't have to buy into it.
I don't value opinions much, even my own opinion, only experience. My experience says things usually work out and it pays to be an optimist.
