I wonder if there’s also some difficulty in translation happening due to adding up inverted numbers for example 1/(a+b+c+…) != 1/a+1/b+1/c+…
replyThat's exactly what's going on. The inverses are very sensitive to small changes at the low end.
replyYou forget that in the US, even with PPP, the level of "comfortable" is higher, due to missing social safety nets.
replyThis means using PPP doesn't actually show where the level of precarity is.
Life in the US is definitely more precarious than in Europe but that has been the case for a long time while median real earnings after stagnating from about 2001 to 2015 have been growing well since then.
replyhttps://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q
There is a huge mismatch between perception and data. I wonder whether some costs are just more pertinent?