Are we in trouble? Maybe. Are we in as much trouble as we think? Probably not.
Great data out of CNN.com today. A fascinating look into our minds, and more evidence of why I picked the right career path.
What percentage of Americans say things are going badly? Almost 80%!
That makes sense, right? You’ve been reading the news. It’s a blood bath out there.
Heck, 73% of Americans polled told CNN they were “angry” about how things are.
But if things are going bad for all of us, then they’re going bad for each of us, right?
Right?
Not so fast.
When asked how things are going for them, about 75% said things were going “well.”
Wait, what?
If things are going well for 3/4 of Americans, then things are going pretty well considering the sky-is-falling dogma I’m reading every day.
We just think that things are going poorly for everyone because that’s what we keep reading.
Yet for most of us, myself included, life is pretty good right now.
So we have to wait out all of this reactionary stock selling for things to recover. But it seems that this recovery is less about raw materials and productivity than the public psyche.
I’m not saying there aren’t problems. Jobs are lost. Families are hurting. But so much of this is driven by speculative stock selling, which is just a bunch of Monopoly money.
This whole mortgage thing is a mess. But we’re making the mess a lot worse wearing alumninum foil on our heads waiting for the sky to fall.
You’re just making the bad news in your head come true.
So, stop it.
I'm a cognitive scientist and communication scholar who manages a psychophysiology lab at Texas Tech. I teach courses about the cognitive processing of media messages and research methods.
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Thanks for the great post!
I agree completely and am another person who strongly believes that there is a ton of subliminal implication to the constant drone of how “bad it is”.
It’s no different than friendships, if you spend your time around doom and gloom people, eventually you wind up with a doom and gloom attitude.
I know there are alot of negatives right now, but things are starting to look up. I would much rather see some media coverage on the people that are surviving and their unique approach to make it through this time. Perhaps the positive thoughts and actions would inspire others to get moving and help make a change. Just my two cents.
Alyson
Alyson Kendall’s last blog post..20 Tweet of Knowledge Challenge – A Twitter Economic Stimulous Project
I wonder if reactionary stock selling qualifies as a form of behavioral mimicry?
Thanks, Alyson. You’ve made me realize I need new friends. No more of these doom and gloom types … like Wes.
The story where a plurality of economists see some recovery at the end of 2009 and strong recovery in 2010 got much less play.
And, Wes, I cannot even process your social psychological trivia
Oh, here we go again… The recession and the near collapse of our financial system is all in our heads. Yes, we’re in trouble, but we must honestly define the problem. It isn’t just the mortgage crisis! If that is all there was behind our current economic crisis, it would have bottomed out already. But Wall Street has been playing fast and loose with all manner of finance: commercial real estate loans, consumer credit, commercial credit, etc. These, too, have been rolled up into smoke-and-mirror investment instruments and traded until their face value far exceeds their real value. And that’s why banks are not trusting one another; a lot of companies and investors are holding near worthless paper and no one has a clue of how much.
Another important aspect is that our markets have been way over-valued for several years now. The Dow dropped to 1997 levels today. 7000 is probably what the Dow should be at.
Finally, investors – the big ones, not the holders of 401(k)s – understand that they are in over their heads and have been pulling money out of the system. They aren’t making much money just now, but they’ve stemmed their losses. This comes at the expense of jobs and those who hold those 401(k)s, which are losing money at record rates. The same thing happened during the dot-com bust.
No, this isn’t all in our minds; there’s no chicken-littling going on here. The threat to our economy (the world’s economy) is real. To some, it’s easier to obfuscate the truth than own up to the fact that we are here because of greed and the refusal of the last administration to enforce laws and regulations.
Sorry, but things really ARE bad. Thanks to irresponsibility and gigantic fraud on Wall Steet, billions have gone up in smoke.
Because “you” are fine doesn’t mean the world economy is fine.
This is more proof that the country screwed up by giving the big ZerO and the dummycrats more power in Washington. I don’t know where they found these idiots but economics 101 says you can’t spend you way out of this type problem. You also can’t hold back the requirement that people who make bad financial decisions must pay the price. Having the government insert go furhter in debt to throw good money against a bad system just makes it worse. The people who made the bad decisions must take their lumps and then the system can reset an hopefully with some healthy safegaurds this time. Bankrupcy is good for the system, let it happen and stop the bandaides.
Opinions never trump data. Data always win.
Three in four say things are “going well” for them.
This is at odds at how people say things are going overall.
Thus, one of the two numbers is skewed.
Human psychology and decades of public opinion research suggest that you’re a better judge of your life than the lives of others.
Hence, those data are more optimistic than is widely being reported.
Have you finally stooped to controversy as a means to generate traffic? Tsk, tsk.
Seriously, there is a good chance those “3 in 4″ had no 401k, were renters, lived paycheck to paycheck anyway, etc., so they’re personal situation is largely unchanged. Cultivation, however, dictates that they’re likely to report the overall state of the economy as they hear it or read it in the media.
Or not.
If you’ve lost your job, times are tough. If not, things aren’t so bad. But here is why we are angry: For fifteen years we’ve made our mortgage payments, building equity in our home so my wife will have security if I die – but suddenly, all that equity is gone. For as many years we have contributed to an IRA, but suddenly it has lost half its value. All those years, all that sacrifice, for no gain. Hell yes, I’m angry.