Jay Weber Show transcript 10-13-23
With everything else going on, lately, no one in the media’s really paying attention to inflation, anymore-
And that might change quickly if this new war has the west choking off Iranian oil production and gas prices spike above four dollars again...
But...for now...these weekly government reports are being all-but ignored.
If you missed it: the so-called inflation number-
The consumer price index- held at 3.7 percent for September, as price hikes-did not cool off- last month, either.
This news was again billed as ‘unexpected’ to the American economists. Folks- if we get the same claim every month that ‘these numbers are unexpected’.... why are we calling these economists ‘experts?
They’re always wrong. Every month-several time a month- they’ve been ‘shocked. Shocked’ that the Biden economy is as bad as it is- or isn’t getting better.
Who are these people? And why are we calling them experts?
Any single on one of us who-as consumers-fill up our cars and go to the grocery store- or shop on-line for goods we need- or pay a service bill that shocks us-
Every one of us knows that this isn’t getting better. Prices aren’t stabilizing or dropping. How can the experts be expressing ‘shock’ at this fact every month?
This news had Paul Krugman and the other highly dishonest ‘celebrity’ economists in the media celebrating the good news that- if you take away gas, groceries and energy costs, these numbers look really good.
Let me emphasize that again: these clowns are so desperate to claim that Bidenomics is working that they are saying: if you erase all of the stuff that Americans -need-and have to spend most of their paycheck on-
Well, then this is going great!
Krugman tweeted: if you take out food, energy, and shelter, this is positive news.
What?
Buy. But...food, energy and shelter are the three things that we all-as humans- need more than anything else. These are -baseline- survivability-sort of needs here, Paul.
We can’t just stop buying them...and when it comes to evaluating the economy and how the American people are all doing.... ah.... Gee... Including the prices of what we are paying for gas, heat, food, and shelter- are much-vital- to any honest answer. Aren’t they?
This ivory tower dimwit at the NY Times -as his ‘smart take’ says- if you take out food, gas, heat, and shelter- this is really looking like a great economy for the American people....
Shouldn’t there be consequences for saying something this staggeringly stupid in public?
A kick in the ‘nods, or something?
We also learned yesterday that social security benefits are going to increase by a whopping 59 dollars a month next year-which has the same left-wing pundits asking- but, is it enough?
Is that enough to offset the costs of Biden’s inflation over the next year?
No. It’s not. And it comes on top of one of the largest bumps that we have ever seen to social security checks that was handed out to seniors last year-
And don’t misunderstand me: I’m not blaming or maligning seniors. I’m on your side-as these cost-of-living increases for this benefit come late-and look meager.
At the same time- the democrats and congress, in general, has social security so screwed up that any additional benefits that we hand out now-make it even more likely that a dramatic cut in social security amounts will have to occur in 2034, if congress can’t get its act together and find more funding.
67-million Americans-are pulling a monthly check out of this pool.
There are about 330-million Americans in this country-and 74 million of them are children. That leaves 256-million adults-and of those- 67 million are on social security, leaving only 189 million working age adults available to fund all those retirements and disability payments. And that’s just one entitlement program. Add Medicare and Medicaid and food stamps and myriad other, smaller, welfare programs and it’s a miracle that this country can function, at all.
But you see the figures: we now have fewer than 3 working Americans paying into every ‘one’ retiree’s social security payment. This program became functionally unsustainable some time ago-and congress still refuse to act to fix it-long term- because the democrats want it as a wedge issue. They only ever want to accuse republicans of trying to toss granny in the street or over a cliff-if they dare suggest changes to it.
And not- cuts. Just-changes.
Any suggested change lights the lefties hair on fire and the spinning and smear campaigns crank up.
And sadly- this time around? Donald Trump is participating in the smearing and falsehoods to try to vilify Ron DeSantis.
But I want to emphasize that Joe Biden’s 40-year high inflation has moved the insolvency date for social security ‘up’ significantly. His inflation means we’ve had to hike the checks of our seniors by 9 and 3 percent over the last two years-just to try to keep up with Bidens’ inflation-and it still falls short.
So, what happens in 2034 if congress doesn’t act?
Well-the first answer is: congress will almost certainly act to at least-spend more on social security. Even if they don’t fix the formula-they’ll probably borrow more or find the funding so the program can continue to be a rolling, expensive failure moving forward.
But if there is no action-well- seniors would suddenly see their SOC SEC checks cut by about 20 percent-and they’d only receive 80 percent of what they are expected to be getting- at that time.
Everyone in dc knows changes are needed and reforms are possible-but the democrats-for decades and decades now- only ever want to play games and smear republicans when the idea of ‘reforms’ are broached.
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