0:00 who are you and where are you going what do you [Music] want hello and welcome to people making money I'm your host Kevin bemel and we're here every Wednesday at 10: a.m Pacific time to talk about starting a business job hunting Business and Professional matters wealth building all of the aspects of our financial lives so
0:37 today is our monthly economic Echoes where we look at the most recent economic indicators and uh work to figure out how they're impacting our lives and and what kind of uh decisions we need need to make as as a result so I'm I'm going to do the show differently today um I'm you know I'm always um working to figure out how I can make this most relevant to you most useful for you and so i' I've put together um
1:15 some information different than what I've covered in the past and hopefully you will find that useful uh we're going to start out with the the the basic economic data um and then I'm going to go to this kind of second part so um as always we start out with uh looking at the Consumer Price Index so let's let's do that there there we go okay all right so um in February uh the Consumer Price
1:52 Index for all items went up 2.8% that's uh down slightly from the month before um but it's still above the targeted 2% rate uh which uh is is um uh What uh the Federal Reserve looks to in terms of um deciding that essentially inflation has been tamed uh food uh went up by 2.6% um which I think is pretty much on line with what it's been doing um energy
2:28 went down uh two10 of a percent so it was essentially even although we'll look at the components and then all other categories went up by 3.1% now the core the so-called core inflation rate which is all the categories aside from food and energy is at 3.1% so that's that's still uh High um you know significantly higher than what the FED wants to see and so um one would imagine we're not going to see uh lower interest rates I I I will say that
3:03 recently there's been uh talk in the media of of a recession there's been a lot of uh discussion about uh the tariffs about tariffs that are being imposed on various countries at various levels and and how that's going to affect the economy um I'll talk about that well I'll talk about that here just for a few minutes and and this is this is uh you know this is not to do delve into the politics situation um but but the real reality is that as I an
3:45 episode last year tariffs are a form of they have the name tariff but tariffs are they are a tax so the idea that um tariffs uh will um generate Prosperity or and uh and will contribute to price increases uh for Americans generally speaking both of those are are not true um just like higher income taxes generally depresses
4:24 economic activity because more more money is going to the government which contrary to you know various assertions the government doesn't produce anything um it doesn't uh it doesn't produce products it doesn't produce uh Services um so um so taxes are a burden on society they don't they don't increase the um wealth in in society so likewise uh tariffs are attack so they have a similar impact now
5:03 the difference between uh tariffs and and specifically income taxes is tariffs do not hit all products equally generally speaking and they do not hit all consumers equally so for people at the upper end of the income range uh tariffs in general don't have a very big impact on them uh you know the reality is that unless we're talking about I know there's been discussions about 200% tariffs on uh
5:39 European wine and liquor uh I I mean essentially what that will do is it will cause Americans not most Americans not to buy that now the very wealthy they'll still be able to buy a bottle of champagne they'll pay you know $600 or $1,000 a bottle I suppose instead of $200 or $300 a bottle um but for most of us we just won't we just won't buy uh European wine and and liquor we'll have to buy uh if if we want that we'll have to buy domestic liquor okay now here's the
6:15 thing the um domestic manufacturers will be able in the face of high tariffs on their overseas competition uh they uh they they will be able to raise prices okay they'll have more uh they'll have more pricing power um because uh their their competitors are not going to be able to undermine their pricing right and so it will be a balancing act for them as to whether um they uh for
6:51 example raise prices to the point where consumers just stop consuming wine and liquor or uh reduce it all that will be in play and or turn to substitutes so it's already uh the situation that younger consumers are turning to among other things cannabis instead of wine and liquor okay it's one of the reasons why uh wine and liquor sales have overall been lower of late okay and so more people may decide to turn to
7:26 cannabis use to get their you know Buzz so to speak um rather than paying higher prices for wine and liquor and and beer so uh it it's it's difficult to predict uh precisely what will happen um with you know with higher tariffs um but suffice it to say that um consumers will make choices uh based on what they can afford okay and so uh you know if if if cigarettes are a
8:03 perfect example the more cigarettes were taxed the fewer people smoked them not necessarily because they didn't want to smoke them but because they couldn't afford to smoke them that's one of the things that that taxes do so again tariffs are a tax um you know are they going to bring in uh a lot of money to the government not necessarily because people may trade other products that are less expensive that aren't being tariffed in exchange for buying the properties uh the the um sorry the goods that are being tariffed so again it's
8:38 it's not easy to predict what will happen um with with tariffs um and and um and so uh we're just going to have to see how this plays out now I will say that um I I think a lot of the um media coverage of what's going to happen with tariffs is much more definitive than than reality uh what really makes it so um you know the idea that tariffs are going to uh push us into a recession uh
9:13 I mean it's possible but um you know what's more likely to push us into recession is a steady media drum beat that we're going to have a recession so um I would encourage you to um to you know look carefully and think carefully about what's being said about the economy much of economic news is politicized um as as you might imagine um as is really it seems all news um for
9:49 the last whatever at least the last you know 20 or 30 years maybe longer and so um just you know just keep in mind that uh a as you know if if something is expensive often times we just buy something else instead of the expensive thing and we kind of go on about our lives so uh you know the these are the these these kind of tradeoffs that we make as consumers are are important and often times um the analysis of what's going to happen doesn't take that into
10:26 account well enough to for to really um anticipate what these various economic issues uh the impact that they'll have on on the overall economy as well as individual consumers okay so that's kind of my my piece on on tariffs um I I I I guess you know full disclosure I am you know very much of a free trade Advocate overall uh the Freer trade is um the lower the cost of goods and services
11:01 which gives um ever more consumers especially consumers at the lower end of the economic spectrum uh more choices now I'm not an absolute free Trader so um when it when it comes to our geopolitical uh enemies not so much our Rivals you know Europe is a geopolitical rival in terms of selling stuff that's fine you know let's let's uh you know let's let's have a a healthy rivalry um you know and and and get the best out of uh you know both both regions but our geop our geopolitical enemies uh Russia
11:39 China um Iran so uh I have you know frankly no problem in their goods uh being tariffed especially those that are crucial for National Defense um and and I think it you look we made when I say we we as a country um made a strategic error quite a long time ago um thinking that for example if we engaged economically with China that that would cause it to uh you know change its Its
12:17 Behavior it would it would cause it to um become a a Freer country Etc I think that was based on the idea that somehow engagement with Russia caused the fall of the Soviet Union um that that was not the case um the Soviet Union fell basically due to um in in internal problems um that um that the Soviet Union could just no longer keep up um and and and you know the the defense buildup in the in the late 1980s and
12:52 early 1990s for example so um we we you know it was not economic engage engagement that that um overturned the Soviet Union it was it was other factors so now look I I I don't fault um Le you know leaders for for trying that it's it it seemed like a good idea I think I I I certainly thought it was a good idea at the time um unfortunately it hasn't played out um the way that we hoped and so now I think as adults we have to acknowledge um our mistakes and we have
13:29 to do something different right so insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result so it's you know it's time for a a new policy uh Vis ofis our our geopolitical enemies and and I think we need to uh you know pursue that forth with so okay so anyway a little bit of a digression into underlying factors on certain on certain economic issues okay so going back to um the the the CPU for February so in food um drilling down you
14:05 can see food at home went up by a little bit less than 2% food away from home 3.7 I went up 3.7% uh food at home you can see that most things were flat except for um meat poultry fish and eggs and I suspect that eggs accounted for a lot of that 7.7% increase and uh non-alcoholic beverage es and materials went up 2% everything else was you know relatively low uh dairy products went up okay 8% but but you know the biggie the biggie here
14:40 driving inflation is uh I suspect eggs it's a it's a weird Confluence of events Aven flu um necessitating this the the the unfortunate Slaughter of millions of egg laying hens um and and you know the the the egg laying uh hen population just you know um egg producers have not been able to um replace them safely and so egg prices continue to rise okay and then uh food away from home so um you
15:16 know both went up 3.7% 3.5% so uh food away from home continues to to go up so if you're eating out you're seeing a higher higher food prices okay energy so uh energy Commodities uh went down again just like last month I think the last several months a little over 3% Energy Services went up by a little over 3% one kind of canceled out the other in theory but of course in practice it depends what your energy usage is so energy Commodities fuel oil went down a
15:52 little over 5% gasoline a little over 3% if you're here on the West Coast we don't use fuel oil so we didn't see um as big a drop in energy Commodities therefore overall we're experiencing a higher level of energy prices okay and then compare that with Energy Services okay electricity went up a little over 2% natural gas went up 6% so um for for me for example Heating in my house is natural gas as is my cooktop
16:28 and I've noticed my G natur natural gas bill has been going up it um in fact it is um close to double what it was a couple of years ago um so you know natural gas PR prices have been increasing um electricity um you know at not quite as fast a rate now if you have an all electric home then um presumably you're not experiencing uh Rising energy costs as as fast as uh people who have like me who have a combined electric and and gas
17:03 uh powered home okay and then all other categories besides food and energy so Commodities essentially flat um and all um Services less energy were up 4% so let's look at Commodities first okay so again we see the the the major increases are in medical care um uh um commodities uh um yeah Commodities um alcoholic bever uh Medical Care Commodities 2.3% alcoholic beverag is 1.7% and tobacco products
17:40 6.6% um so uh you know th those are the biggest um increases cars went up uh less than 1% new vehicles went actually went down apparel went up 6% so you know not big increases there okay then on the other side of things things Services less energy so shelter went up over 4% Medical Care 3% transportation services 6% so the reality is um most of us use all of these and so um the fact that all
18:16 items less food and energy went up 3% uh unless you if you're a non-tobacco user like me so that may moderate this factor a little bit um but the reality is I think most of us are probably experiencing inflation really at a higher rate than the 2.8% overall rate for February okay next let's let's go [Music] to okay uh let's go to current and real
18:56 earnings okay so make sure yeah you're seeing okay good all right so um again very little change uh from January to February you know a penny in real average hourly earnings which you know doesn't really equate to anything um and on a weekly basis earnings went up uh 9924 um you know for a week I mean that's you know absolutely di Minimus um and and then um uh average uh hourly
19:33 earnings um um so though so that's unadjusted for inflation not not really relevant average weekly hours worked stayed flat at 34.1 hours so it you know at the same time that we saw um uh you know average earnings for the month um basically unchanged okay they went up 0.1% if you recall uh February inflation if you read the little graph there it went up 0. 2% so you know we continue
20:12 overall to lose ground um against inflation okay not not not a great thing okay so if you're not feeling quite so flush uh now as you did um more you know a couple of months ago um you're not imagining it that that that is reality okay so now let's look at the um unemployment rate so overall the civilian unemployment rate for February 4.1% up just slightly from January okay men 20 years and older uh it went from 3 point uh sorry
20:48 went from 3.7 to 3.8 so again just a small adjustment women uh went from uh also 3.7 to 3.8 and finally teenagers oops where did teenagers go let's get rid of men women okay let's look at teenagers there we go okay so teenagers went up from 11.8% in January to 12.9% in February okay that probably reflects um uh you know more teenagers
21:24 going back to school we'll look at the um uh perent uh of percent of population working numbers in just a moment okay so that's in terms of age in terms of demographics so uh white Americans uh um unemployment went up from three and a half% in January to 3.8% in February uh Black Americans uh unemployment actually went down from 6.2 to 6% this month okay asian-americans uh let's see here we go
22:00 it went from uh here we go oops it's hard to sometimes they overlap so let's get rid of that okay so asian-americans uh also went down from 3.7% to 3. 2% in in uh February and then finally Hispanics and or Latinos um they unemployment rate went up from 4.8 to 5.2% now uh let's as I always say unemployment rates mean nothing until you also look at
22:37 uh um the civilian labor force partic participation rate okay so um the labor force participation rate uh went down to 62.4% from 62.6% okay so um if we um if if we then look at the um unemployment rate going up slightly so unemployment went up even as the labor force participation rate uh went down
23:13 which means the unemployment picture is is worse than the unemployment rate uh is is showing okay so for men uh 20 years and older the uh labor force participation rate went down a half a percent from uh to 69.8% from 70.3% okay not a good Trend the labor force participation rate for women 20 years and older um went down just slightly a tenth of a percent uh from January to February
23:50 it now stands at 58.9% okay so not necessarily a big deal there um but uh but the male labor force participation rate decline half a percent is significant okay and then excuse me Teenagers uh why why am I not seeing teenagers okay there we go so for teenagers the labor force participation rate um went from 36.3% in February to
24:26 37.2% in February so the labor force participation rate went up which is why we saw uh a higher unemployment rate more teenagers are coming came into the workforce uh an increase of almost an an entire percentage point and so that would naturally uh increase the unemployment rate because more teenagers are are looking for jobs but don't have them okay now let's look by uh demographic trffic okay so white
25:01 Americans uh their labor force participation rate went uh down by just a by by two10 of a percent so it now stands at 62.1% uh Black Americans the labor force participation rate actually went up from uh January was at 62.5 5% it's now at 62.7% so a slight increase which which in the face
25:36 of uh as I recall the unemployment rate among black Americans declined slightly so even as more black Americans are looking for work yet their um uh uh their unemployment rate went down which means a lot of black Americans were were finding uh were finding opportunity we're finding jobs I should say okay the labor force participation rate among Asians went from 64.7% in January to 65.5% in February that's an 810 of a
26:13 percent increase and again as I recall uh their unemployment rate went uh went down as well so again the prospect the job prospects for asian-americans are good in the case of almost a whole percentage Point increase in labor force participation um their unemployment rate dropped um three half a percent okay so again job prospects for Asians improved significantly uh from January to
26:48 February and then finally for Hispanics and Latinos okay labor force participation rate essentially unchanged it went up a tenth of a percent uh from Fe from uh January to February it now stands at 66.9% and you know again looking at the um unemployment rate it went from 4.1 to 5.2% so in terms of job prospects whites and Hispanic Latinos are prospects job prospects declin January to February
27:23 black and asian-americans they improved why the racial dis parities hard hard to say um it could be the particular sectors in which um different groups work uh you know could the these could you know come down to Regional factors um so for example if economies in the Southeast uh were doing better than those uh on in the west and in the Northeast that would tend to mean because uh Black Americans
27:59 are more concentrated in the Southeast that would tend to mean that they benefited more by the um stronger economies in the Southeast that that's just an example okay now let's take a look at okay employment by industry so uh as is has been the case now since I've been doing these the biggest increase in employment was in
28:34 the um uh was was in private education and Health Services and um and now government uh actually is not a big one of the top three increases that that's I think largely due to the change in administration so construction saw a big increase um I I I would be willing to bet a lot of that is in on the west here in Los Angeles okay transportation and warehousing also saw a big increase as did um Financial activities so and then
29:11 the losers were uh Leisure and hospitality and uh retail trade those were the the two biggest decliners and then professional and business services so let's look at these in detail okay so private Educational Services saw a gain of um almost 10,000 jobs healthc care saw a gain of uh 52,000 jobs and social assistance saw a gain of a little over 11,000 jobs okay now um health care jobs increased in all sectors okay now um it it is important
29:47 to note that a lot of uh health care jobs are are government funding is really what drives them so so you know we're cons we're continuing to see job increases there um and some of that is funded you know by by the government because of Medicare and Medicaid okay um let's look next at construction okay so uh construction of buildings um in uh they saw about a 2,000 job increase heavy and civil engineering about 2500
30:24 and then the biggie was specialty trade contractors so over 14,000 jobs created so construction of buildings residential actually very little 100 jobs it's injust uh non-residential buildings really saw the bulk of of the increase in jobs in construction with with 1700 jobs uh now in terms of uh I'm going to skip heavy and civil engineering let's look at specialty trades so interestingly enough residential specialty trades saw over 12,000 new jobs uh so it's the specialty
31:03 trades in residential which would tend to be I think remodeling um perhaps than uh than new homes okay and and only 2,000 non-residential specialty trade uh contractor jobs increase and I okay that's that's the detail we have there okay next looks look at Financial activities so finance and insurance over 10,000 new jobs uh real estate and rental and leasing saw almost 10,000 new jobs okay um most so the new jobs in in real estate were in real estate itself
31:39 and um and in rental and leasing Service uh lessor of of non-financial intangible assets I'm not even sure what that is frankly but they saw no job increases okay uh and then um in terms of finance and insurance um really those jobs came in Insurance 5,000 and securities commodity contracts Etc saw about 4,000 and then credit inter intermediation these are things like mortgage uh like loan brokers and such they saw about 1300 new jobs okay money Authority Central Bank that kind of
32:14 thing saw almost no as they saw Zero new jobs okay so it's it's non-banking jobs that increased in financial activity okay and then finally uh transportation and warehousing so ciers and Messengers saw over 23,000 new jobs um Air transport saw 3500 new jobs those were offset by a drop of almost 2,000 jobs in trucks trans transportation and a loss of 4,000 jobs in um in where uh Transit and
32:50 ground passenger transportation and uh 3,000 jobs in warehousing and storage so um couriers and Messengers we're seeing a lot of uh I maybe I don't know if that's that wouldn't be postal workers because that's under government but uh private services like um FedEx uh um UPS it looks like they did some some some hiring um over the last month um air transportation uh also saw
33:25 uh 3,500 new jobs so that's that's where that's where it looks like those jobs are gaining now let's let's look at government jobs because we've been tracking this um and you can see federal jobs dropped by 10,000 okay which was largely offset by 20,000 new local government jobs now this is a change from the previous administration where we we saw gains across all government sectors so that's that's what's causing the drop in uh the drop in overall government job
34:01 gains okay so you can see um uh Federal accepting the post office dropped 6,700 jobs and the post office dropped 3500 so that accounts for the losses of of of federal jobs in terms of local governments uh local government education increased by over 10,000 and local government excluding education slightly less than 10,000 which which accounts for the 20,000 jobs okay now let's look at the drops the biggest drop is in Leisure um activity Leisure and
34:36 Hospitality I should say Arts entertainment and Recreation saw almost 8,000 new jobs but that was more than offset by a TW almost 24,000 jobs lost in accommodation and food services so uh as uh as pe oh okay that's we don't get more detail than that so as the cost of eating out is increasing jobs are being lost in the Food Services business okay um now in terms of job gains in arts entertainment and Recreation where we're seeing them is the the gains are coming
35:13 in uh spectator sports and Performing Arts almost 11,000 um a small gain of not quite 2,000 in museums and historical sites and a loss of almost 5,000 uh jobs Amusement gambling and Recreation okay so theme parks and that sort of thing Las Vegas they're they're dropping jobs okay and and it makes sense because like to go to Disneyland is enormously expensive these days I know I may have mentioned this last month uh when when I was a teenager you know we could go to Disneyland and spend
35:48 about five6 dollars for the entire day tickets and food uh now a on- day ticket to Disneyland and I think costs $1150 or $200 okay parking is is 20 plus dollars add food onto that so for a family of four to go to Disneyland for one day is well over ,000 and I just don't think families can can afford that okay so the other drop um in jobs retail trade so uh you can see Mo motor vehicle and parts
36:24 dealers actually Increase jobs 5500 general merchandise retailers this would be uh Walmart Target they increased uh over 10,000 jobs and gas station and fuel dealers increased 5600 jobs now those were partially offset by 15,000 jobs lost in food and beverage retailers okay um and again you can see that um as food prices go up people are are shopping less they're buying less are tightening their belts I know I
36:59 certainly have um and that's causing job losses home uh Furniture Home Furnishings Electronics lost over 4,000 jobs again people just aren't buying these things uh health and personal care products lost 2400 clothing and jewelry uh and accessories lost 2,800 jobs and books and other miscellaneous lost almost 2,000 so you can see only three sectors of retail trade um saw job increases in those are really things that we just can't do without can't do without gasoline we need to be able to drive to work general merchandise now
37:35 general merchandise retailers like uh uh Walmart and such people are probably grocery shopping there as well so I I don't I think that's where Walmart you know grocery shopping jobs are included in this category as opposed to food and beverage retailers so so you can see people are are looking for way to cut prices right and and then motor vehicle part and parts dealers so you know cars need to to uh we need parts to do repairs and I suspect people are buying more of Their Own Parts and doing the
38:10 work themselves okay uh uh yeah and and in fact here automotive parts accessories and tire retailers increase of 3800 jobs um automotive dealers went up 1,800 jobs so most of the job gain in come in um uh came in automotive parts okay let's look at this no there's no detail there okay now let's just take look real quickly compare this to the one-year picture and and here you can see um again private education Health Services has been the largest increase
38:47 in jobs almost a million jobs over the last year um government was the second largest over the year adding almost 400,000 jobs I would expect that the the trend we're seeing this from February I would expect that to cont uh to continue and we're going to see losses of federal jobs um somewhat offsetting gains in local government jobs and so overall gains in government are probably going to uh diminish um as we move farther
39:22 into the Trump administration's time and office okay now it's interesting to know that over the last year Leisure and Hospitality gained over 200,000 jobs even though more recently they lost jobs that's kind of a seasonal thing somewhat I think as well as a reflection of higher costs for uh for for going out that that that sort of thing okay so we're going to start to see um we're going to start to see the um 12mon figures more closely aligned with the one month fig fig figures but right
39:58 now they are not as aligned as um as they had been last year okay next let's look at think I just have one more yes okay so let's look at okay at and and um actually I'm gonna I'm going to cancel this for a minute so now I'm going to go to the this the second part of this um because uh what I did is I did some research on uh economic Statistics over
40:35 the last 30 years to get an idea of just on a on a day-by-day basis how have prices changed on things that most of us probably buy okay and and and and and how has that changed in the real world so first of all if we look at the Consumer Price Index for all Urban consumers between 1995 okay and February of 2025 uh it changed to um um in an amount
41:13 that represents a 10.4% increase in prices over the 30-year period which means prices slightly not slightly a little bit more than doubled in the past 30 years that's the overall inflation rate okay so um unless income doubled in that same period okay um we're not keeping Pace with inflation
41:49 and so um what I'm going to show you now is a chart on um median income where is it yeah okay real median household income okay as reported by the uh Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis okay so um and and the most recent figures we have for this are 2023 okay so the median uh real median
42:24 household income in the United States was 8 $1,610 as of 2023 okay now compare that to 1995 where it was $63,750 okay so the reality is that it's gone up over not quite 30 years 28 years it's gone up by um about $177,000 right yeah not quite yeah yeah just about
43:00 $177,000 okay so 177,000 as a percentage of $3,770 is roughly 30% okay so here's the thing over the last 30 years okay as although prices have more than doubled median household income has only gone up by about 30% okay just slightly more than 30% now
43:36 you'll notice by the way that most of that gain in uh median um household income was realized between 2014 and 2019 and in fact um after 2019 starting in 2020 which was when covid hit okay it peaked in 2019 at $81,300 dropped to a little to 79,500 2020 to 79260 in 2021 and to
44:13 77,500 in 2022 it didn't bounce back up until 2023 still not reaching where it was back in 2019 Okay so so um the fact of the matter is that um our incomes have not kept pace with overall inflation okay in fact overall inflation has been roughly three times the increase in median household income
44:49 over the same period okay so um you know if you're you know my age um and and can remember uh the 1990s and and even the 2000s it it seemed like uh you know things were easier economically that appears to be the case Okay so uh you know this is what anyway the statistics are are are telling us so let's look now at um oops wrong thing uh here we go
45:29 okay so let's look now at some specific items and how their prices changed during that three-year period okay so first of all I looked at uh the C the average retail price of regular gasoline in the United States so in 1995 a gallon of gasoline retail was was around a doar 15 okay now as of March 17th which is just two days ago the
46:04 average price average price for regular regular gasoline was $38 per gallon meaning that over the 30-year period gasoline increased by 168% um much higher than the overall inflation rate so even though the cost of gasoline right now is is dropping over a 30-year period it it's gotten much higher okay and it's it's it's increased at roughly five times the
46:41 rate at which median income has increased now there are Regional differences so although the overall average price of gasoline is three over $3 on the East Coast it's slightly under $3 uh in the midwest a little bit more under $3 Gulf Coast it's $2.60 Rocky Mountain just just under $3 here on the West Coast it's over $4 a gallon which means we experienced gasoline inflation at a much higher rate than the rest of
47:17 the country okay and the fact of the matter is you know we have to be able to drive that that's that's how it goes so in a a com there's not here on the West Coast especially and the same is true in the Rocky Mountains and Gulf Coast where there's and Midwest where there's not a lot of other Transportation options right so it's gasoline is something that it's hard to replace with something else all you can do is not drive as much okay and that's why for example you know you see less uh you know
47:52 Recreation um spending uh you know during during High inflationary times is because people can't afford to drive as much and so they don't go to places where they would spend Recreation money right so um unlike other things for example certain types of food um gasoline really there's nothing really to replace it with okay now in theory with the Advent of of electric cars that should give us a choice but electric cars are more expensive than conventional cars uh number one and and so to
48:27 buy a new car that's more expensive than the one you have doesn't necessarily put you in a better overall financial position and the cost of electricity is rising as well and so there's there isn't any particularly good alternative okay now you could say well I could use Uber well that's true but you know as the price of gasoline increases as the cost of insurance increases as the cost of vehicles increases so to will the cost of uber so Uber is not is not protected from these other types from
49:03 these other price increases okay all right let's next let's look at um okay what did I look at next okay um yeah the price of a car okay I used a Toyota Corolla only because it was a car that's been manufactured for the last 30 years I guess I could have used a Jeep Wrangler that's what I own um but but je Wranglers have changed a lot I think the Toyota Corolla has has been you know pretty stable so the manufacturer s manufacturer suggested retail price of a
49:39 Toyota Corolla in 1995 was $1,378 okay um now there was a higher end model priced at a little over $177,000 uh as of as of 2025 the price of a Toyota Corolla is between a little over $22,000 and just slightly more than $28,000 so it's gone up by you know something between 50 and perhaps
50:15 70% okay so it has the price of a car hasn't gone up as fast as inflation okay uh but it has still gone up faster than the rate at which median income increased okay so so again uh uh you know if if you if you bought if you have have to buy a car right what you can afford now is probably not as good as what you could afford 30 years ago okay this is the sort of slipping of
50:51 standard in standard of living okay next I looked at a pound of red delicious apples why red delicious there's been a lot of changes in Apple varieties that are available in the store so I know my favorite apple is a Pippen Apple you can't find them anymore you can find Mrs Smith's which is another type of tar green apple but the pippens you can't find anymore but red delicious apples have been available uh consistently for decades okay so in 1995 the average price of red delicious apples in the
51:26 United States was approximately 83 cents per pound now I looked up online the cost of uh red delicious apples and I found here at Ralph's which is a local supermarket we have uh here in in Southern California um one red delicious apple is $1.99 now I don't know what the weight of that apple is but I'm guessing it you know it could be uh you know I'm assuming it's a it's a Big Apple for $1.99 so it could be eight or 10 10 ounces uh but still you're talking about
52:04 uh a big increase in apples now um you know doing my research I found that um uh the the sort of average is uh apples are selling now for about $245 per pound unless you're buying them by The Bushel right bushel is 42 pounds I don't think any of us are buying buying Apples by The Bushel for our homes right it's they would they would spoil before we ate them all uh so what that's saying is um apples have gone up by a factor of roughly
52:40 300 I'm sorry 200% they've tripled in value much faster than the uh rate of inflation and obviously much faster than uh than median income has gone up okay next I looked at uh the price of carrots just regular old orange carrots in 1995 they cost 60 cents per pound uh to in March of this year uh March of 2025 their price varies from about 90 cents a pound to about a175 per pound so in
53:16 other words they went up by 50% to roughly 200 100% um so anywhere from you know half the rate of inflation um over the 30-year period to almost double the rate of inflation I I I you know I'm guessing by the way that the higher and price is for the you know already peeled and cut carrots um as opposed to you know just plain carrots so my you know my guess is is that um you know if you just buy a bunch of carrots that you then have to wash and peel and and Etc
53:51 and cut yourself make carrot sticks like they used to when I was a kid right so probably went up about 50% um in the last 30 years uh less than the rate of inflation but still more than median income went up okay uh a gallon of whole milk cost $2.50 in 1995 in February of 2025 it costs a little over $4 so it's gone up by about a150 in 30 years okay so that's uh roughly a
54:27 60% increase again less than the uh overall inflation rate um but higher than the increase in median income okay then I looked at a loaf of Wonderbread why Wonderbread not because it's healthy but because wonderbrad has been around for a long long time okay so in 1995 a 22 oun loaf of Wonderbread cost 99 Cents or about 45 cents per pound okay in February of
55:02 2025 uh wonderbrad uh was selling for about $3 per pound a little over $3 per pound okay uh so that's a um an eight that's it's about seven and a half times what it was selling for uh 30 years ago that's an enormous increase and obviously much a much bigger increase uh than than median income uh and then let's see what else did I look
55:37 at yeah the rest I couldn't get good data oh yeah the last thing uh I looked at was the cost of a hannes white a hannes undershirt um and why haes undershirt again because um they've been around for a long long time it's it's kind of a staple uh white undershirts of a wardrobe okay so in 1995 hannes undershirts were priced between a $150 and $3 per t-shirt okay today the cost of a hannes t-shirt is
56:15 $44.75 per shirt uh in other words haes t-shirts have gone up by a factor of about uh one and a half to three times okay again uh higher than the rate of inflation uh and and much much higher than the rate at which uh um median income has has increased so why these why these this sort of second set of Statistics well what I wanted to uh present to you is a a a set of products
56:53 that with possibly the exception of of a car there there isn't a whole lot of substitutions for I mean okay we could buy you know oranges instead of apples maybe we could buy you know celery instead of carrots but the the reality is you know we we need to eat fruits and vegetables we need to have gasoline to drive okay you may not drink milk but milk is a staple of most people's diets they you can substitute water I suppose but water doesn't have any nutritional value it's good for hydrating but has n no nutritional value and um while um you
57:31 know clothing is there are lots of substitutes for clothing per se but for sort sort of basic staple clothing like an undershirt not I mean aside from just not wearing them right there's not really a substitute for them so the reality is what we're seeing overall over the last 30 years is Big decreases in certain uh certain prices um and this is what I'm going to look at next week I I think what we're going to find is the cost overall of telephone service has
58:07 gone down um the the the cost of of those kinds of things have gone down okay but the price of everyday Commodities has gone way up and so uh while the cost of food has gone uh oh the other thing I wanted to look at was I'm sorry let me look at one more thing yeah okay and I I I think I may have um I may have shown you this uh chart before um so where is
58:42 it okay here it is okay so this is this is a chart showing the ratio of uh of of home values home prices to median income so um through 1995 and even up until about 2000 they were in the range of uh of four to five um and and never went above about 4.6 in change okay and as recently as 1997 they were down at basically four okay and then starting in uh this is
59:20 around 1999 and into 2000 they started going up and then in 2002 they went over five times okay peaked at about 6.8 they went back down to around five stayed in the five to six range but more recently peaked all the way up at seven and as of November of 2024 they're at 7 excuse me 27 which is which is an all-time high now I think I may have mentioned this uh when I talked about
59:56 this last time um uh there there's somebody out there saying well you know homes are much bigger now um and and that's why they're so much more expensive um but but the reality is that and let me let me find this data here um the in 1995 the average floor area of a new single family home was approximately 2100 square feet whereas by the fourth quarter of 2024 the median size of a new single family home uh was at about 2200 square
60:31 ft so median and average are not precisely the same thing okay um the uh the average uh home size in early 2025 was just under 2400 square feet but what that really means is although um the size of a home has gone up by about 300 square fet or about 14% okay um since 1995 when uh when you know median
61:06 household home price to median household income was a little over four it's now at at seven so so uh the median home price to household income has almost doubled while the size of a home has only gone up uh by about 15% so housing too has become much less affordable um over over the last 30 years okay and and and
61:41 so again if you're if you're old enough to have uh you know lived through the last 30 years um you know as as at least a teenager if not an adult so the idea that life seems to be getting more expensive um it it is the case the things that we have to have shelter food gasoline um have have definitely gone up and much faster than the rate of inflation the overall rate of inflation now and and I think the reason the overall rate of inflation is much lower is luxury items things that are not
62:18 essential like Leisure and those kind of things have overall gone down okay so for example the cost of airline travel has gone down okay it's gone down significantly relative to other costs so and more people travel by air today than ever before so but if you're not someone who travels a lot you're experiencing uh a a much less affordable lifestyle than than people who can
62:53 afford uh more uh non-essential items okay and especially for people in the in the lower economic levels the affordability of the essentials of life is is less today than it was 30 years ago okay and what are the roots of that we'll talk about that on on another on the next uh economic Echoes as as we expand on this so um I'm G I'm going to leave it there for for this month and I'm going to continue this second part of economic Echoes and we'll be touching on different subjects about uh what is
63:31 more affordable what is less affordable why is that the case we'll we'll continue with that discussion over the coming months so I thank you very much for joining me um today especially those of you who who join me live I always it's always a kick to see my my live viewers uh My Little Live viewer counter up in the corner there um I I I hope you find this uh useful and feel free to drop a comment in social media the links will be in the show notes um you know after the show posts
64:07 on YouTube um would love to hear your thoughts if there's uh if there's an aspect of this that you would like to know about that I don't cover in particular please tell me I'll be happy to to do the research and and talk about that as well so this is my last show for this week thank you so much for joining me especially if you joined me earlier in the week uh looking forward to seeing you next week on Monday at 10: a.m. with trust and Estates weekly Tuesday at 2 am with business lessons from the military a week from today for the next edition of people making money and then next
64:44 week on Thursday at 5:00 pm Pacific time for my every other week show jiggers is place where we'll sit back and have a cocktail and we won't talk about all the surus of of Business and Professional and economic lives will talk about all the other parts of life that make it so meaningful so wish you a wonderful rest of the day and rest of the week thanking you again for joining me and signing off Marie darling you are my bell courage at all times my friends