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Comment by db-interface | Hacker News Reader

> Especially so since their wages haven't gone up comparably to match.

The economic data indicates that average income has gone up more than prices have since the start of the pandemic. If you look at Real Personal Income (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RPI) it's up 5% relative to the end of 2019.

And if you think inflation is way higher than is being adjusted for, you're simply wrong. The MSRP for a 2023 Mustang GT is $38,345 (https://www.kbb.com/ford/mustang/2023/). The 2020 was $38,320 (https://www.kbb.com/ford/mustang/2020/). The price of Chicken Breast is up 38%, not 100% (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/APU0000FF1101).

Yes, public opinion is irrational, but the more obvious political question is why public opinion is so wrong now, when often it is not so pessimistic about the economy.

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>average income has gone up

To that I would say there is likely a problem with average. I didn't see a break down of the data in your link, but admittedly its my lunch break and I didn't have the time to really dig for it either. But its entirely possible that some groups saw an outsized growth in wages while others didn't.

>The MSRP for a 2023 Mustang GT is $38,345

The MSRP of a Mustang GT is $42k before options https://shop.ford.com/configure/mustang/model/customize/ecob... The GT Premium is $47k

Apples to apples here -- the 2020 GT Premium was $43,315. So we're still not looking at nearly the same size of increase.

You think the average income is being computed incorrectly? Or that there is just a lot of variance so many people are worse off? It is true that wage increases have been uneven, but they are actually much larger at the low end -- this is why you see the most inflation in low-wage service-heavy categories like restaurants.

You have data all wrong.

In 2020 I could get Mustang GT for $8k off MSRP. In 2023 Mustang GT MSRP is $42,495 and there is only $500 off.

https://www.ford.com/cars/mustang/models/gt-fastback/

Unfortunately I could not find data on prices after discounts -- I would love if you could point me to some! I find it hard to believe the average discount in 2019/20 was $8k off on a base trim GT, but if you actually bought one with that discount then fair enough. Note that's still a significantly smaller increase than my parent comment indicated.

You didn't even get MSRP for 2023 right. Try to learn google or bing or something.

The link you gave me is the 2024 MSRP, not 2023. No need to be rude, especially if you're not going to actually read my comments or your own links.

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