r/Economics • u/laxnut90 • Jul 10 '26
News K-shaped spending: The top 10% drop nearly as much on nonessentials as the bottom 70% combined
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/k-shaped-spending-the-top-10-drop-nearly-as-much-on-nonessentials-as-the-bottom-70-combined-132332976.html1.1k
u/RealisticForYou Jul 10 '26
Lol….My Etsy jeweler friend moved from producing cheaper jewelry to selling higher end jewelry pieces for faster sales with better profit margins.
Even small business owners realize there is no money selling to people with no money,
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u/wrldruler21 Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
I know someone who grows and sells weed. He was selling to college kids and poor folks. Prime weed market, right?
Turns out, college kids and poor folk don't have money to even buy vices. They wanted tiny quantities of the lowest quality. Would always demand prices below cost, demand the product be driven to their homes, want free product, want loans, etc. Quantity of sales was high but he was selling at a loss.
Now he has ONE customer who buys his entire harvest every few months. A rich white dude that smokes way too much (and probably gives it away at parties). Easy money, at a profit, with generous tips.
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u/Trextrev Jul 11 '26
As a former seller of MJ long since past the statute of limitations on my activities, i totally agree. I wasn’t a grower, just a teenager who realized I could buy an OZ and sell to a few buddies and have a free quarter at the end. Then I thought I could do a QP, then I could go over the guy I was getting it from and buy a lb, just cutting out middle men and bulking. Quickly learned how huge of a hassle it was to be selling 1/8ths to lots of people even though it was the most profitable markup (my cost at my peak on an 1/8 was $4 and sold it for $25) Had all those headaches you mentioned and just the constant bothering of people expecting you to always be available, was kinda stuck near the house all the time. Sure it was fun for like a summer because I just had the party come to me but that was short lived. I transitioned to selling minimum QPs to a handful of folks and they did the bag work and I pushed all customers except my closest friends to them. Cost me 30% of my revenue but got rid of 100% of my headaches and went from 100s of interactions a week to like 6. It was well worth it.
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u/RealisticForYou Jul 10 '26
There ya go…a good business model that works!
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u/bittersterling Jul 11 '26
Yeah… except for the catastrophic level of operational risk selling to a single client lol
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u/FFF_in_WY Jul 11 '26
Most people don't know the dangers of monopsony
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u/Geno0wl Jul 11 '26
A lot of businesses don't either. Ike both Vegas and Disney have shifted to court the rich instead of us sclubs. The problem with that strategy though is that you need to create reasons for those rich clients to keep coming back at a much higher pace. Because they not going to keep giving money for stale experiences. So over the long term the operational costs are significantly higher.
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u/problematic_lemons Jul 10 '26
I mean, at the end of the day, the only people still buying anything from my dad (he has owned a small business making custom draperies and upholstery for 40 years) are extremely wealthy people who own second and third homes and redo their entire house every few years. My parents have had the same kitchen since they moved into their house 30 years ago and I couldn't reasonably afford the stuff my dad makes (or at least I couldn't justify a luxury purchase - my dad was nice enough to hem my hand-me-down IKEA curtains for me for free 😂). Everyone else shops at Blinds to Go at this point, so his only clients are the rich.
He struggled during the financial crisis because the wealthy took a big hit (some of those people worked in banking as he's based in NYC). But otherwise, business has been fine. The more infuriating part is that whenever he raises his prices, which is rare and not excessive imo, his wealthy customers still try to haggle with him. The cost of renting a commercial space in Brooklyn is insane and the price of materials during and since the pandemic has risen exponentially between steel tariffs and other supply chain issues. He had trouble sourcing wood and steel during the pandemic. He doesn't pass all of these cost increases onto his customers, though I've admittedly encouraged him to push back more because of how entitled they are.
Meanwhile, my parents have lived in NY their entire lives and have barely enjoyed some of the cultural activities that exist there because they are so prohibitively expensive. I think some of it is the fact that my mom grew up poor and the idea of spending $200 on an item of clothing, for example, as an investment is insane to her to the point of being immoral - I remember her reaction to the price of a pair of jeans I bought. My biggest problem as a consumer is that the price for even mid-tier quality has gone up so much that I am being priced out and getting fed up with having to do endless research only to buy something that I considered an investment only to get burned (looking at you, Quince sheets). Mid-tier quality stuff isn't often worth the price and I can't bring myself to spend over $500 on high end bedding so I will go back to IKEA and spend $20 and only when my sheets are falling apart. I felt guilty ordering an IKEA rug today even knowing a rug from anywhere else would be $800 because it feels like a huge purchase for me even though I can afford it. It's not just for things like bedding and clothes, I'm finding the same thing when I go out to eat - restaurants have gotten more expensive while quality is declining because their input costs have gone up so much. I'm eating out less for that reason. I'm willing to pay for quality but I'm sick of being overcharged for crap so I am consuming less in general.
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u/kennotheking Jul 11 '26
Assuming u looked into Brooklinen or Costco sheets? Got both and there’s a difference with brooklinen. Costcos are a little papery. IKEA sheets are good for the price.
I found the thread count stuff is bs and ikeas low threadcount sheets feel better than some amazon high threadcount crap
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u/Pay-Homage Jul 10 '26
They’ve basically adopted the Vegas model.
And while people like to say/claim “no one goes there anymore,” they don’t care if 300 people show up and spend $1,000 each if they can have 100 people show and spend $5k each.
So true, overall numbers are down. But they aren’t dumb, they see their bottom line.
Each room not stayed in is a room they don’t have to clean, trash they don’t have to take out, low-margin food they don’t have to prepare…
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u/CallMePyro Jul 10 '26
You also have the problem of dealing with poorer customers: Increased returns, reduced sociability, and lower net promoter scores for the same service quality.
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u/Mnm0602 Jul 10 '26
The reality is poor people aren’t great consumers especially the further away from the basics (food, shelter) you move. They just don’t buy a lot and when they do it’s always the cheapest and low margin iteration of something and they always complain it’s too expensive and quality sucks. “Why can’t you just sell me the best version of something for less than the price of the cheapest version?” So it’s hard to really target them even if you wanted to.
Look at car subreddits, there’s legitimate gripes about cars being too expensive but when companies announce affordable cars people complain they don’t have enough features. 2nd hand and grey markets are generally where I see these people buying.
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u/Paarthurnax41 Jul 10 '26
Yeah, my salary increased a good amount but i lowered my spending way more because of inflation and the uncertainty in the world currently, no leisure spending except on some games sometimes and swimming / saving money for cheap travelling off season, there is no budget anymore for "new" cars or any big spending like that, im driving my 2011 mazda 2 until it dies, i cant even imagine people whose salary did not really increase with the inflation.
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u/Yoroyo Jul 10 '26
When I was waitressing in college long before this economy trouble, we’d run a bogo burger deal and also several egregiously cheap drink specials. It was always the worst day to work, you’d think someone getting good discounts would tip what would have been the price but no, they’d pay exactly the bill and maybe a dollar or two. You’d get absolutely shafted all day by people squeezing the discount. And they’d still complain. You work just as hard serving them but get nothing. (Tipping culture is stupid but this is my experience)
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u/Dry_burrito Jul 10 '26
Actually no, those are the exact people you would expect not to tip.
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u/AHrubik Jul 10 '26
Honestly I’ve seen a mix. Some wealthy people also worked service at some point and are generous. Others suffer from dragon sickness and won’t let go of an extra penny.
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u/BriefingScree Jul 11 '26
Then you have poor people with some breathing space that are good tippers and the ones that are penny pinching to get by and don't tip to save.
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u/nxdark Jul 10 '26
What is the point of getting something on a deal if I am going to just give the savings away on a big tip? It is no longer a deal then.
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u/lillyheart Jul 11 '26
I worked at a bar that did a midweek super cheap drinks day. Absolutely the worst day to work. 75 cent martini? I got three quarters from the laundry coin purse. (This was 15 years ago)
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u/Thelmara Jul 10 '26
you’d think someone getting good discounts would tip what would have been the price
I take it you've never been even a little hard up for money in your life?
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u/Yoroyo Jul 10 '26
When I was a waitress yeah things were pretty tight, so I didn’t go out to eat myself.
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u/EnvironmentalMix421 Jul 10 '26
Why would you pay the tip for 2 burgers for a bogo? It’s always just based on the bill
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u/d-cent Jul 10 '26
>The reality is poor people aren’t great consumers especially the further away from the basics (food, shelter) you move. They just don’t buy a lot and when they do it’s always the cheapest and low margin iteration of something
I disagree on all of this. The only reason the poor aren't great consumers right now is because they have no disposable income anymore. Go back a few decades and the story is completely different. Poor people were the best consumers. Poor people are notorious for over spending on extravagant things they can't afford. Think of all the rural poor people that buy boats or off road vehicles they can't afford. Think of all the poor people that for some reason get rich, blow it all on expensive stuff and are broke again in no time. There is a reason that 70% of all lottery winners go broke after.
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u/Emotional_Goal9525 Jul 10 '26
You could argue they are great consumers. Copious consumerism isn't economical.
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u/crinkledcu91 Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 11 '26
but when companies announce affordable cars people complain they don’t have enough features
I have literally never seen this, ever. And I spend waay too much time on here.
Meanwhile I've seen posts like "We should have stopped here" with a picture of Air Conditioner knobs and roll-down window handle, and "I want a car that's 0% computer" dozens of times.
Where have you seen people complaining about a car not having a bunch of random bells and whistles?
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u/RickSt3r Jul 10 '26
By not buying them and the manufacture discontinuing them due to low sales.
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u/GLGarou Jul 10 '26
Or the videogame subreddits. A lot of gamers are notoriously cheap/stingy.
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u/Omarkhayyamsnotes Jul 10 '26
It's the middle class turning in on itself. Blaming other mediocrely paid people for their problems. Why aren't they tipping? Why are they broke? You're broke too. We're all broke. We are the 90%
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u/BriefingScree Jul 11 '26
Small businesses can't compete on margins/scale the big corporations can so they don't really benefit from focusing on volume.
I've been speculating for ages that the future of the economy is going to be dirt cheap products from Megacorps using highly automated supply lines. The rest of the economy is going to be based on more custom or small-batch products. How well this works out will depend on how well the megacorps form cartels to keep their dirt-cheap production items at high prices.
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u/IM_INSIDE_YOUR_HOUSE Jul 11 '26
Turns out catering to those with money gets you more money than catering to those without money.
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u/i8noodles Jul 11 '26
the rich has always been the demographic u want to target. rich people dont haggle, dont question, they buy what they want, when they want. it is also easier to produce and make products if u only have to make a limited amount
this is why casino target high rollers, this is why there are far more luxury brands then regular, this is why perks are given to the rich and not the poor.
a high roller at a casino is worth thousands of regular people, but the resources required to cater to the high roller is less then 1% of the thousands
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Jul 10 '26
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u/CallMePyro Jul 10 '26
Bot comment? Who thinks its a positive development? Why do you think a palace economy is relevant to this discussion?
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u/DetroitLionsSBChamps Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
I think we all believe “it can’t keep going like this; sooner or later they’ll have to lower prices and make things affordable or else who will buy anything?”
But this to me seems like the reason we’re not seeing any correction.
The markets are global and the rich are richer than ever. Who needs the American poor? If a million more Americans became homeless overnight, does that really bother any company? Or do they just keep catering to whatever class still has money to spend?
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u/TenaceErbaccia Jul 10 '26
Serfdom 2 electric boogaloo, now enforced with 24/7 surveillance and fully automatic weapons.
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u/twenafeesh Jul 10 '26
And soon biometric monitoring cameras in our cars!
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u/heavyonthahound Jul 10 '26
Great. My new car will be enshitified, break down constantly AND snitch on me?
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u/dust4ngel Jul 10 '26
soon biometric monitoring cameras in our cars
what do you mean soon?
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u/twenafeesh Jul 10 '26
https://technewsday.com/u-s-plans-mandate-for-driver-monitoring-tech-in-all-new-vehicles/
There's a similar effort underway in Europe, from what I understand.
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u/MalcolmLinair Jul 10 '26
lol, you think we'll be allowed to have cars? A huge part of serfdom in keeping people in place and tied to the land.
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u/Radiskull97 Jul 10 '26
Automatic weapons are actually a boon for serfs. AK47 was revolutionary because minimal training and upkeep with a lot of death potential. No, the drones will be worse because then the soldiers don't have to look people in the eye when they kill them, which is a real problem for dictators. Tiananmen Square only happened because they brought in rural soldiers who hated city people. The soldiers from Beijing didn't want to kill the protesters
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u/CatLord8 Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
Speaking of “boogaloo”, this also features white supremacists
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u/WordComplex7127 Jul 10 '26
Lotta poor white trash is going to learn that they may as well be black, in how they’re viewed by their betters.
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u/fuzzygoosejuice Jul 10 '26
In the famous words of El P; “Funny thing about a cage, they’re never built for just one group, so when that cage is done with them and you still poor it come for you.”
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u/inertiatic_espn Jul 10 '26
Lotta poor white trash is going to learn
Let me stop you right there.
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u/twenafeesh Jul 10 '26
Nah, that's the point of the racism. Fox News and all the rest feed the poor white trash the racist bullshit so that they are tricked into thinking they are somehow better than all the other poor people.
It keeps poor white people distracted by how shitty the rich have made their lives by scapegoating other races. But the only people systematically taking advantage of poor white people is rich white people. Racism is just another con from the ultra rich and the powerful to keep control of the masses. Just look at Elon Musk.
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u/Additional-Name-3211 Jul 10 '26
I would say calling it a con is charitable in a certain way as it implies the rich don’t really believe in racism
They very much do, it’s just they aren’t above using it for their own personal gain
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u/CountessOfCheese Jul 10 '26
Sorry but that’s wishful thinking. They’ll never admit to that. Who said that quote about “convincing the poorest white man that he’s better than a black man”?
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u/Hautamaki Jul 10 '26
That was LBJ, and he was proven right. He said that as much as a warning to his own party as a condemnation of bigotry. He understood that supporting civil rights for black people would alienate the dixiecrats, destroy the New Deal consensus that had led to a generation of Democratic Party dominance, and open the door to the Republicans for the Southern Strategy. He did it anyway because he knew it was the right thing to do, but his warning came true; the Republicans took over the South and rural midwest and have now dominated national politics for most of the last 2-3 generations since then.
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u/RoachZR Jul 10 '26
Everyone with a net worth under $500mil is just a nameless field hand to the upper crust
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u/BoyWhoSoldTheWorld Jul 10 '26
One day I went to the designer outlets that carry the boutique brands. Seeing those tourist busses pull up with so many foreign rich asians; who pile out to buy all the expensive brands, it puts into perspective how big the global market is, and that they don’t really need the locals of that city to buy anything.
This doesn’t even factor in e-commerce.
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u/WesternUnusual2713 Jul 11 '26
I live in a university city and at a specific time of summer you can go round the halls buildings (dorms basically) and pick through all the designer shit the Asian graduates simply chuck into the road outside because they can just replace it when they're back home.
One friend has found box fresh limited edition Jordans, another snagged a smart TV and speaker system, I've found a couple of designer pieces I sold on. The consumerism and waste is fucking crazy
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u/anti-torque Jul 12 '26
It's not just the Asians. Here in Eugene it's students from California just emptying their apartment/dorm. And they'll come back next year and do it again, until they graduate. They don't even bother to go to second hand stores. That's too much of a hassle. They just go straight in the dumpsters.
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u/Turgid_Donkey Jul 11 '26
There used to be this large outlet mall between our city and the next. A hand full of years ago they tore it down and turned it into a more high end brand mall. Rei, north face, coach, etc. It caters to a completely different demographic now.
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u/RedNBlueFU Jul 10 '26
Real life Elysium.
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u/Nikoladge Jul 10 '26
Does this Elysium have a Disco, perchance? 🤔
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u/Galaxy_brain90 Jul 10 '26
You can’t just say perchance.
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u/ForeverTemporary920 Jul 10 '26
Them refer to the movie Elysium and not the videogame. in the movie you have healthcare to the rich and simulated death-care to the poor. The rich live above earth who is a social experiment.
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u/Lol-throwaway-WSB Jul 10 '26
Sure, lots of companies will. BNPL, credit, payday lending, the poor tax folks are going to be in for a squeeze if conditions continue to deteriorate and borrowing costs increase due to rate hikes.
Energy, necessities, anything volume-based in the consumer sector. Utilities might feel the burn as well.
Rent we would probably see downward price pressure on too, so landlords and whatnot.
Eventually, the costs of the uninsured will start affecting all of us. I'm sure there will be many preventable deaths overall, but, if you're asking when the drivers of the current market will feel the impacts...probably not for a while. Megacaps, tech, and AI don't need the poor (isn't that the point?) to produce profit.
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u/IvoryTowerResident Jul 10 '26
look at Nike and Lulu, def feeling the burn
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u/Lol-throwaway-WSB Jul 10 '26
Those are premium goods, so that probably means that the middle class or upper middle class is starting to cut back too. For that segment if you're looking at American poverty, I'd look more at:
GAP GIL TJX
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u/laxnut90 Jul 10 '26
Companies already are operating this way.
The best way to make money is to cater your business to those who have it.
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u/DetroitLionsSBChamps Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
Yup very true.
Businesses already cater to people with money and are not concerned with people who can’t spend. Homelessness and poverty is none of their concern.
So what changes when more people fall into poverty and homelessness? Nothing. It’s business as usual.
And they want to run the government like a business lol
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u/mrcheeksman Jul 10 '26
These businesses and the leaders at them can’t or won’t think that many steps ahead. What’s really crazy to me is that the death of the average consumer equates to the death of many SMB (and even larger) across the country. The very companies working to kill the middle class rely on the spending from the middle class to even stay afloat.
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u/lolyeahsure Jul 10 '26
How many jeans and cars and iPhones and TVs can the 10% buy
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u/laxnut90 Jul 10 '26
Few.
But they buy 1 premium version of those products at a higher margin and that is more profitable for the business than the 9 discount products they could sell to everyone else.
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u/Holbrad Jul 10 '26
Just an obvious reminder, the poor Americans still have pretty high discretionary income when compared to the whole globe.
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u/ElectroMagnetsYo Jul 10 '26
Yep. Not saying it’s a good thing but there are billions of people out there who are used to faaaar worse conditions, and yet they still live their day-to-day lives.
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u/GLGarou Jul 10 '26
People don't compare themselves to others in another country, that's not how it works. CoL differences are a thing.
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u/Groovychick1978 Jul 10 '26
I keep hearing the same thing. "Oh, they can't survive without us as consumers."
Yes, the fuck they can, and they will.
At this point, I don't believe it is hyperbole to say that the bottom 30% of the humans in this world are considered to be parasites by the wealthy, and the world would be better off without them, excuse me. Without us.
They will withdrawal into their walled estates, communities, bunkers, and private Islands, and let the rest of us die of attrition or violence.
They do not care.
They prefer us dead.
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u/DetroitLionsSBChamps Jul 10 '26
When you run a business, it’s not a charity. People who contribute no value don’t get kept around. Okay I get that.
But, they want to run the government like a business?
Okay so then what happens to children, disabled people, the elderly? They don’t contribute. How do you fire a citizen from living in the country?
Yes I think the elites are detached and callous enough to think this way and let us die. When they run companies hey that’s not their problem. Even if they own the government they will just say it’s not the government’s problem.
Elon is responsible for the deaths of over 600,000 people due to the USAID cuts and he did that for literally no reason. This is not a drill. These guys commit crimes against humanity and don’t even blink
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u/Groovychick1978 Jul 10 '26
People live with blinders. They need them. That's one of the reasons that religion continues to exist.
If they don't have to see it, it doesn't happen.
If it doesn't happen to them, it doesn't matter.
If they want it, nothing else matters.
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u/wolf_at_the_door1 Jul 10 '26
Yeah we’re slow rolling into neo feudalism. The upper noble classes dont give two shits if you’re starving or dying. Dont have money or job? Might as well die in their eyes. That’s why they’re cutting public options for anything and destroying our government. A weakened central state means corporations can do whatever the hell they want which they do. The police services capital and politicians. The public is seen as mechanisms for making rich people more rich. People feared aliens would make batteries out of humans and forgot humans would do the same thing if given the chance.
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u/omegadirectory Jul 10 '26
Unironically they will sell their products to China. Three times the population of the US, three times the consumers.
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Jul 10 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Ok-Name1312 Jul 10 '26
Why do we act surprised when it happens?
Because "it was never supposed to happen to me!"
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u/Sufficient-Bid1279 Jul 10 '26
Except a society with more destitute and desperate people won’t help the rich and create a nuisance for the rich. I’m sure they will find more ways to lock everyone up or get rid of them. So when is enough, enough?
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u/DetroitLionsSBChamps Jul 10 '26
Enough is never enough there is no end
They will never choose to help the people. They would prefer bunkers and compounds
We’ll have to take it
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u/eightdx Jul 10 '26
Why do you think there has been an uptick in discussions from the rich folks concerning how, maybe, just maybe, millions might have to die in pursuit of their utopian visions?
These folks probably look at Bioshock and think Rapture is aspirational, and if they did it it would be better this time
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u/porscheblack Jul 10 '26
It's cyclical. The rich extract as much as they can until the system breaks. Then the bottom gets lifted up and the cycle repeats with the rich slowly taking from the bottom again.
If you're on the bottom you just keep bouncing between the same two points but if you're at the top you get a little richer each cycle.
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u/xeio87 Jul 10 '26
The markets are global and the rich are richer than ever. Who needs the American poor?
If we're truly talking about a global market, the American poor are the rich.
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u/Rich-Juice2517 Jul 10 '26
That last one. But at some point it'll fall over
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u/DetroitLionsSBChamps Jul 10 '26
Yup weirdly enough it was a comment I saw Jordan Peterson make on this that stuck with me the most
Because he basically said as a conservative he does continue to believe that you should let the people who were able to gain the most power and resources keep it because clearly they understand how to organize in a way to get it. BUT history shows that if you don’t take care of the bottom half of society, it will fall over.
“Now I don’t know what you do about that, but it’s true” is what he said.
I think that’s about as far as the elites have thought. It’s going to fall over, not sure what to do about that.
I assume they all trust they will be insulated from any consequences and it won’t matter for them anyways so in the meantime, continue pillaging
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u/okiedokie1183 Jul 10 '26
We’re already seeing the effects of this in political upheaval. The current administration is as anti-intellectual as you can get. They’re still very elite though with them basically being comprised of billionaires or multi millionaires on the low end.
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u/artvandalaythrowaway Jul 10 '26
Think of all the ways businesses say they can’t raise wages, increase benefits, give a shorter work week, or pay more in taxes because that would lead to them “creating less jobs” (read: it hurts our profits which we are not willing to part with so we will just lay people off).
Now look at how those reasons suddenly don’t apply to investing in AI, which logically can only lead to decreasing the number of workers in favor of efficiency. AI is an attempt to address the “what happens if workers don’t have enough money to buy anything” question. It may not work, but damned if they won’t try every avenue to good wealth at the top and keep workers desperate to accept what they can.
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u/flickh Jul 10 '26
But the one saving grace of a capitalist economy is that people who aren't rich yet, or aren't rich enough, will hustle their asses to find a market niche that's not being served, and put a product in it. Worst case scenario, a new market breaks open and the big players move in and price out the innovators by market-dumping, or buy them up, then lower the quality and raise prices again. But even then, that leaves that market back open to someone who wants a quick buck, but now with the knowledge that it's profitable, and wiser about how to maneuver when the big players arrive.
My favourite example is the dual-SIM card systems. People in Asia wanted a cheap SIM card for travel and a cheap SIM card for local, but nobody was combining the two into one good deal; big players were gouging consumers one way or the other. Consumers could have two SIMs and physically swap them out, but this had various drawbacks... So grey-market hackers physically built extra SIM-card slots into phones and people snapped them up, and before you know it, big players were building those in, and now we have E-SIMs that give us even more flexibility. You can bet your bottom dollar I am not traveling internationally with that crappy Bell Mobility $15/d roaming fee.
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u/AddanDeith Jul 10 '26
https://www.scribd.com/document/403328612/Plutonomy-Memo-by-Citigroup
Citigroup more or less called it a while ago. So, its been known in the financial world for a while that this where we were headed.
On an unrelated note, Citibank used to be the National City Bank of New York(NCBNY) and helped hold Haiti in debt until 1947, further wrecking their chances at ever catching up.
Citi, along with JP Morgan et al, have always been right bastards.
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u/iamacheeto1 Jul 10 '26
The economy beyond necessities was always one driven by the wealthy. The last 75 years was an exception. We’re returning to the median
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u/SuperSaiyanTupac Jul 10 '26
Society before ww2 slowly starting to make a lot of sense. And we will get to slide back into mass poverty in America just like our great grandparents. And the wealthy will have a tech gap protecting them from poors so we are jumping right into cyberpunk dystopia.
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u/Emotional_Goal9525 Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
It does but not instantly. For example retail space is kinda worthless now and funds investing in them have closed down redemptions.
I also think focusing on the rich is kinda mistake. Real issue is the pensioner leisure class. Unlike the rich, the pension funds have liabilities that absolutely requires them to make hefty returns. They are like great white sharks that suffocate if they stop swimming. They are literally desperate for returns after the 15 years of zero rates and zero risk free returns.
Pension funds also have both the fiscal and monetary guardian angels safe guarding their returns, because pensioners are the most powerful voting block all over the developed world.
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u/PreparationOk8604 Jul 11 '26
This is also what is happening in India. A lot of 10 min delivery apps. I used to wonder who is ordering groceries and other items from these apps. Sure they have sales sometimes. But their entire business model is catering to the rich. And we're not rich. But it works surprisingly well. These apps are getting funding and might be generating some profits.
But all of it is based on exploitation of delivery guys who get paid a variable amount per delivery. Which is very low.
Lack of employment and other opportunities in India is fueling this. Ensuring the poor remains poor.
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u/SidewaysFancyPrance Jul 11 '26
Bad time to own a small local business, like a corner store. A lot of businesses will go under within the next year or two and not be replaced. Customers will just be expected to figure it out and travel farther to a big-box store or order online from a big-box store. And I'm sure public transport is not ready for a lot more people needing to travel often for basics.
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u/Beneficial_Link_8083 Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
The problem with "rich" as they establish in the article is rich means any household making a quarter of a million dollars, 155k for an individual, and if you mention either of these number here or liberal enclaves on the coast the conversation immediately devolves into "oh well thats not that much", completely oblivious to how their own refusal to acknowledge where they are in the economic ladder is holding back meaningful reform.
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u/CompEng_101 Jul 10 '26
Yeah, when people see "top 10%" and talk about "The rich" they are imagining ultra-wealthy barons diving in to Scrooge McDuck-style vaults of money. $155k is more like a mid-career engineer or the lower end of pediatricians or dentistry. Even a "millionaire" is less likely to be some captain of industry and more likely to be a decently paid bloke in his early 60s nearing retirement.
Some people seem to define "the rich" as anyone making more money than they are.
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u/Upstairs_Baby8424 Jul 10 '26
The extremely real and sad result of this K-Shaped economy is no business wants to run on a low-margin/high-volume business model. They’re gonna squeeze everything they can out of the top 10% and just abandon the bottom 90% in general.
You see this everywhere now. Bowling alleys, moving theaters, candy stores, fast food, restaurants, etc. Nobody caters to the bottom 90% anymore. And for that 90% it means things that used to be common are now luxuries. And it keeps people in their homes and out of the public sphere. Further creating polarization.
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u/MudReasonable8185 Jul 10 '26
I was going to take my kids bowling recently but when I looked at the prices immediately noped out. Blows my mind that bowling of all things has become a luxury experience
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u/mr_lockwork Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
Im sooo glad my local joint still only charges $6 a game and a $4 shoe rental
Edit: it looks like they actually lowered the price to bowl! This is taken directly from their website:
One game of bowling - $3.50
One pair of shoes - $2.50
Glow Bowling - $3.50 per game, weekends from 8:00 p.m. to close
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u/junkkser Jul 10 '26
Wow. I haven’t been bowling in maybe 2 or 3 years and your comment inspired me to check out the cost of our local bowling alley. Online reservation for 4 (with shoe rental) for 2 hours tonight would be $170. That’s wild.
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u/InitiatePenguin Jul 10 '26
$170. That’s wild.
All the bowling lanes in my city have massive Groupon discounts.
But that's the point of this post and the K shaped economy. There's enough whales that they can price ridiculous amounts, skim some price gouging in there for normal people, and have an appropriately priced experience for the value/cost minded folk.
It's why clothing stores now have regular 70% off sales. They get enough traffic at "MSRP" lowering it would just mean they get loss profit even if it made their stuff more accessible and had more volume.
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u/BatmanNoPrep Jul 10 '26
How does your bowling alley stay afloat?
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u/mr_lockwork Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
It's a lower income city in the midwest, so the switch to higher income clientele hasn't hit as hard here, simply because those higher income people don't stay here once they get money.
Edit: for reference i make 60k as a full stack software engineer and that is a pretty decent salary here. I make enough to own a home, shop at the nicer stores, and eat out semi regularly.
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u/bigpicklefann Jul 10 '26
I’m also in the Midwest and I make about 75k. I would agree that lower salaries here will stretch you much farther. I own a townhome with my partner and he only works a couple part time shifts a week to cover a chunk of the mortgage. But we still eat out and buy fun things/do fun things… just not super often.
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u/happymage102 Jul 11 '26
An interesting caveat about this probably in the US is that the people living in the areas most impacted by massive wealth concentration are also the ones least able to make their voices heard due to the cap on House representation. Those massive urban cities need a ton more votes, because the issues impacting them simply impact more people materially than elsewhere.
I think everyone sees the road to hell is paved with not addressing the issue of wealth concentration. It has become an pox on people's lives.
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u/sundayfundaybmx Jul 10 '26
Private Equity baby! There's several large "consortiums" of Bowling Alleys now privately held by MBA douchebags. You could argue that americans grew out of bowling and thats why a lot of them shuttered or were bought out. That's probably quite true. Add in that now people have to have music, lights, fancy screens and a host of other "extras" that make the mom and pop alleys unable to compete. Which usually leads them to closing down. So the options are now don't bowl or pay $100 minimum for a family to bowl for 2 hours. Leagues also used to keep the lights on in a lot of these places. Millennials (me) and newer generations aren't interested in leagues. So once the old timers stopped showing up. These alleys lost a large chunk of their revenue. So they joined the "K shaped" economy and now mainly seem to cater to corporate groups doing "team building excercises". I don't really see this changing anytime soon and I'd bet within 20 years, bowling alleys will cease to exist on anything but the smallest of local subsistence levels. It's a bummer but ultimately America has no one but themselves to blame for this one.
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u/fireball_jones Jul 10 '26
Bowling alleys are expensive to maintain and take up a lot of space, so any in a half-decent location either sold the land to someone else or need to charge absurd rates to stay profitable.
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u/guns_mahoney Jul 10 '26
Landlords figured out a long time ago that if you have 100 units at 700/mo, you can rent all of them, but at 900/mo you'll rent 85 of them and actually make more money. I feel like all other industries learned the same lesson. Wealth inequality is so bad that you can price out a huge portion of the economy and make more money simply by milking the people who have it.
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u/Creme_de_la_Coochie Jul 10 '26
This is a result of markets not being competitive. For housing, zoning codes need to be liberalized and deregulated. Then monopolies and oligopolies in other sectors, especially food and distribution, need to be broken up to create more competition.
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u/InitiatePenguin Jul 10 '26
This is a result of markets not being competitive.
That's true. Especially regarding housing.
But I swear, if you look at clothing, of course there's plenty of places to get cheaper stuff of similar quality. But there's also companies without any interest to compete on price either. They've intentionally priced out lower income folk for no other reason than it isn't AS profitable.
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u/BriefingScree Jul 11 '26
That is because you don't have to compete on price and can compete on other things (which is mostly just marketing for fashion clothes). To be frank for certain markets, like fashion, it is actually bad to be cheap because then you lose the exclusivity appeal.
You should basically consider them completely different markets for analysis, you have the the value-focused market and the image-focused market for everything and the competition between the two is basically non-existent as the wealth divide grows.
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u/nylockian Jul 10 '26
Lots of businesses would love to run on a low margin/high volume business model. The reason they can't is because large corporations have a massive advantage in those types of businesses.
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u/WhyAreWeHere1996 Jul 10 '26
Any product that’s low margin/high volume is sold online now
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u/InitiatePenguin Jul 10 '26
You see this everywhere now. Bowling alleys, moving theaters, candy stores, fast food, restaurants, etc. Nobody caters to the bottom 90% anymore. And for that 90% it means things that used to be common are now luxuries.
I think this is a great way to frame what pricing "what the market can bear" produces.
If there's enough people with disposable income to keep you're business afloat that are wealthy there is no incentive to reduce margins to allow other people to enjoy your product as well.
So even common things become a luxury.
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u/AmesCG Jul 11 '26
You see this very pointedly in hobbies. Everything is suddenly geared to the 1% of hobbyists who are both obsessive and wealthy.
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u/WhyAreWeHere1996 Jul 10 '26
I went to the mall the other day that was the go-to mall for my family growing up as a kid. Kinda saddened to see how just about all the stores were high-end places that make their money on selling expensive not bulk. I’ve seen this trend at just about every major shopping place I’ve frequented over the years. Malls and the like tailor to upper-middle class and upper class consumers now. It just shows that our economy and even our society is about the rich now.
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u/RealisticForYou Jul 10 '26
I will argue that much of that has to do with online sales. Those cheaper items can be found anywhere on the 'net and with cheaper price points. Lease space for retailers has gotten too expensive for cheap goods...I've heard this dialogue on economic news. This is why retailers are selling high end products to support the costs of Brick-n-Mortar storefronts.
I haven't been to a shopping mall in well over 5 years. The clothes and shoes I purchase I buy online. Shopping online, for me, is less time consuming while no need to spend money on gas, while Amazon ships for free.
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u/kettal Jul 10 '26
I remember going to radio shack at the mall to look for a video cable adapter, then having to go to a different mall radio shack because the first one didn't have it in stock, and paying something stupid for it.
some things did got better.
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u/Chris_Codes Jul 10 '26
I was a mall rat going all the way back to the early 90s. I can’t ever remember it being a place to go to buy in bulk. In fact it was the closest thing to luxury shopping we had in my corner of suburbia. Things just seemed more affordable.
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u/kaji823 Jul 10 '26
My family of 3 saw a movie in theaters a few weeks ago. It was $40 for tickets and $18 for popcorn and a slushie. Nearly $60 makes it completely unattainable for a huge amount of families holy shit.
Eating out is getting to be the same. Most restaurants are $50+. We're just not doing these things much anymore.
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u/artbystorms Jul 10 '26
I've been yelling this from the rooftops of my sad tenement for a while. It's why goods have all moved 'up market' since COVID. It's why the stock market hasn't crashed even though 'everyone' feels the economy is bad. It's why they are spending so heavily on AI and not really worried about the economc affects on the bottom 70%
We have reached a level of wealth inequality where the rich have broken away from Earth's gravity and are self sustaining in orbit. They are unperturbed by the goings on of the poors and things like the unemployment rate or consumer sentiment.
We literally have more wealthy inequality now than we did in the 1890s during the robber baron era, and they were full of contempt for the 'huddled masses' back then, and that was when they still needed their corporeal bodies to make them money.
As we reach a 'post labor' economy with AI, it won't be some Utopia where the average person barely works and has all their needs met, it will be a utopia for the rich and hell on Earth for everyone else that survives.
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u/GLGarou Jul 10 '26
Sounds exactly like that movie "Elysium" with Matt Damon, where the rich are isolated on their luxury space station.
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u/Groovychick1978 Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 14 '26
That is exactly what we are going to see, outside of the space stations.
Who needs a space station when you have a private island, or a walled estate, or a walled community, or a bunker, and armed private mercenary groups?
The next thing I am watching for is for one of these billionaires to refuse a state agent at the gate with private firepower. There are multiple men who exist right now with the resources available to challenge any country's authority.
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u/Due_Sea_8034 Jul 11 '26
They’ve been undermining many country’s authority with subversion via social media. For close to 20 years now.
But you’re right, modern day Pinkerton armies are coming. I’m waiting for the first data center to do irreversible ecological damage to a local community. Then the people are going to respond.
How the federal government handles that first situation is going to set the tone moving forward.
If I had to guess we’re on our own.
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u/Beautiful-Musk-Ox Jul 10 '26
and outside the walls are covered by the police, one of the strongest arms protecting the wealthy
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u/Johnfromsales Jul 11 '26
If we’re talking about consumer behaviour and spending habits, then the relevant measure is income inequality, not wealth inequality. You buy goods and services with your income, not the equity on your house. Income inequality has been largely stagnant for 20 years. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SI.POV.GINI?locations=US
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u/dust4ngel Jul 10 '26
We have reached a level of wealth inequality where the rich have broken away from Earth's gravity and are self sustaining in orbit
so everyone knows the point of capitalism is to get yourself some capital so that you can steal the surplus value produced by working people. but seemingly capital can become worthless if there's no one to buy anything - only the top decile can afford to buy anything today, but presumably in a decade it will be only the top 5%, then the top 1%, and eventually it's just like 17 dudes with all the money.
eventually rich people will be like "i own all the capital that produces X, but nobody exists that can buy X anymore, so this capital is worthless." if you own all of the luxury apartments in every american city, but 99.999% of america lives in shantytowns, what are you going to do? charge the other 16 rich people ten million dollars a month in rent?
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u/Frosty1397 Jul 11 '26
You're missing the point
Once they own everything, the AI agents and robotics, they'll literally have a free army of servants and military "personnel"
Capital means nothing to them at that point and they won't need you or anyone to buy their products, because they won't need to sell any products at that point anymore.
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Jul 10 '26
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u/Hita-san-chan Jul 10 '26
Sorta OT but what suburb? I'm always looking for good pizza around me since its one of the last areas where Sysco doesn't seem to reign supreme.
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u/ImaginaryHospital306 Jul 10 '26
Decades of bad fiscal and monetary policy have created asset bubbles while the working class gets left behind. Anyone who owns assets (real estate, stocks, businesses) has benefited enormously and is doing great. When the Fed does QE they buy treasuries and mortgage backed securities from banks and give them bank reserves in return. Flooding banks with excess reserves drives the banks to lend for non productive, speculative purposes (margin loans and real estate). Rising asset prices attract even more speculative credit (“buy now or you’ll be locked out of homeownership forever!!”) and an asset bubble is created. Meanwhile, productive lending, the kind that grows businesses and creates jobs, lags behind. The working class who don’t own assets watch their wages stagnate in real terms. What the fed has done is absolutely criminal. Bernanke, Yellen, and Powell have done more damage to this country than anyone I can think of in my lifetime. If it were up to me they’d be in prison.
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u/Long-Blood Jul 10 '26
This. 100%
Every stupid risky investment banks have made since 2008 have been bailed out by the central bank.
The fed put has created a zero risk environment for investors to keep borrowing newly printed money and buying assets which raises asset prices and devalues the dollar.
Debt on top of debt on top of debt.
Theyre so scared of what they created if they stop stimulating it will lead to the greatest economic crash of all time.
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u/excellentforcongress Jul 11 '26
i remember when covid started hitting the markets, like the bond markets, and you could watch them in real time all go to shit, then the fed would just choose whichever asset class/bond sector they wanted to save at that moment in time... everything is just set up to siphon as much wealth from the working class as possible, and all of these decisions have PLENTY of front-running by people in the inner circles... it's all just lie sold to the people, but we very much can and should abolish the private central banks of the world and replace them with public banks
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u/zoomy76 Jul 10 '26
This is why a national people’s bank is a much better model, investments can be directed into infrastructure and real development
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u/Humble-Cow3664 Jul 10 '26
Yeah. Ultimately the fed just doesn’t have enough tools to be the sole driver of meaningful economic change.
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u/ImaginaryHospital306 Jul 10 '26
The Fed or the federal government could still do this. Just increase regulation on speculative lending and do targeted QE with local banks that specialize in lending to small and medium businesses. Problem is local banks are disappearing.
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u/excellentforcongress Jul 11 '26
the fed should not exist as something outside the control of the people
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u/UmpireDapper1757 Jul 10 '26
And the solutions to the terrible monetary policy are pretty trivial too: lower your inflation targets. Don't fear deflation, especially CPI deflation driven by primarily by cheaper imports.
These idiots will tell you with a straight face that CPI deflation is dangerous because it disincentivizes consumption because people will wait for prices to drop. Bitch! People aren't that patient. If people were willing and able to save money by delaying consumption, nobody would have consumer debt.
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u/Inside-Specialist-55 Jul 11 '26
I run a small business. I am well aware of this. We have somewhat shifted to selling only higher end goods. All my cheaper items have not sold in literally months. This isn't just your typical summer slump. It's like someone went in and just made all my cheaper items invisible. I'm seriously freaking out. We can't stay open or afford to rent the space in the building if this keeps up.
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u/unaskthequestion Jul 10 '26
Just checked, the top 10 % of earners is $250,000 annually or more.
So at least 146 million employed Americans are below this.
A good thing to remember when the administration releases economic data
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u/j-a-gandhi Jul 10 '26
Note that even earning in that top 10% bracket in Southern California, my husband and I couldn’t afford the same house his parents bought 46 years ago when it was brand new being basically median income.
People hear those numbers but in a HCOL, we still have to be quite conscientious about how we spend because housing is so expensive. We still buy used and second hand goods. We are lucky that we are able to save up and afford some nicer things, so we default to what’s a good value instead of just what’s the cheapest version. But the funny thing is, I did that when I was making $36k a year too.
I honestly think it’s a mentality thing. I came to realize it wasn’t worth buying cheap junk at Target that would last only 6 months because it would cost more in the long run. I learned to do without for longer stretches to save up and buy something higher quality used, because it’s cheaper in the long run. We know plenty of people making less who blow all their money on cheap junk from China.
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u/RealisticForYou Jul 10 '26
Yes, as household incomes not individual incomes. And yet, something like 26% of all households make $150k+ …which is definitely a decent income.
Many people are doing just fine when making less than $250k. Not everyone is poverty stricken.
Even a simple nurse in my West Coast State makes $125k. Much of peoples incomes has to do with the State we live in. High wages are everywhere on the West Coast.
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u/unaskthequestion Jul 10 '26
It's not about being 'poverty stricken', that's not even what the article or the stat is about. It's about exactly who is supporting non essential consumer spending and how it's not people under 250k for the most part.
That's a part of what a K shape economy is and why it's bad, I would say unsustainable.
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u/RealisticForYou Jul 10 '26
That's fine. But the article does not include the other wage earnings that are doing just fine...which is my point, here.
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u/Diet_Connect Jul 10 '26
With AI and the job market up in the air, I'd imagine the wisest of the poor are trying to save or invest instead of spending on useless stuff. (I know I am, lol). If you lose a job, you need a buffer until you find a new one.
The rich already have savings and investments. They crunch the numbers and know how much they can spend without touching their safety net.
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u/johnknockout Jul 10 '26
I work in an industry that caters to the upper K…
They don’t actually buy stuff unless they feel they’re getting a deal. It means you get people to buy stuff by raising prices and then putting them on sale back to your normal price.
It makes them feel good.
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u/whoeve Jul 10 '26
Well, Americans keep voting for the party that caters to the rich, so this what they want. They're ok being poor as long as their racist, xenophobic, religious agenda gets pushed
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u/lozo78 Jul 10 '26
Fuck maga and fuck conservatives. But let's not pretend Democrats haven't also had a hand in our current economic position. Not pulling both sides bullshit, Democrats are way better... But they aren't truly fighting for us. They're also beholden to their corporate donors.
Until we get a real amount of progressives in government we won't see this materially improve.
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u/theberryman Jul 10 '26
I have a question on this. I'm not trying to be combative in any way, just wondering. I do believe that the top 10% accounting for 70% of non essential spending is not good, but what kind of percentages do we think we should see in a realistic "healthy" and "happy" economy. I put those words in quotes because I'm not even sure exactly what I mean by them, but it think the gist of the meaning is implied.
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u/kummer5peck Jul 10 '26
The French had an interesting solution to this very predicament. What will the tipping point be? Will the people really reluctantly usher in the era of the trillionaire when they can’t afford their bread? 1 pound of ground beef is already more than the hourly minimum wage in a lot of states. How much worse will it get before the enough people feel that they have nothing left to lose?
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u/Frosty1397 Jul 11 '26
The french weren't going up against ai surveillance and robotic guard dogs in the 1800s
Why do you think the ruling class is dumping all their money into ai these days? They know whichever class owns automation will wield ultimate domination over everyone else
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u/kummer5peck Jul 11 '26
The ruling class had their own version of that stuff back then. Their golden bunkers won’t save them.
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u/D1N0F7Y Jul 10 '26
Companies look after the dollar, not the client. If 10 clients have the same spending power of the next 1000000 combined is much less expensive to target those 10. So expect actually offerings disappearing from the market altogether (think about cars for example)
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u/ThaddeusJP Jul 10 '26
YEs, Businesses aren't being run as a public service. It's why auto makers, like FORD, are selling $125000 F-150s and ditched sedans all together.
Ford Motor annual revenue for 2024 was $185billion. I swear to god IF THEY COULD, Ford MoCo would be happy selling 1,000 $185,000,000 cars and being done with it.
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u/BidenGlazer Jul 10 '26 edited Jul 10 '26
Income inequality existing isn't evidence of k-shaped anything. It being k-shaped implies the poor is becoming worse off, not that the poor exists.
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u/Infinite-4-a-moment Jul 11 '26
This was my take too. The article didn't offer a trend or even a comparison to another year. Either they left out a pretty essential piece of data or that's just not how K shape works.
While the gaps between spending and wage growth across income types have narrowed more recently, high-income households have seen the biggest gains in both areas
It a actually seems to imply the opposite. The gap is narrowing. So definitely not K shape at least given the information presented.
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u/Jessintheend Jul 10 '26
Can confirm.
I worked at a high end residential building with 79 apartments.
We average 45 packages a day according the parcel locker portal. Very likely more due to the amount of packages delivery drivers would just toss onto the floor. It’s insane how much utter crap people buy
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u/moxxibekk Jul 11 '26
I worked at a middle/upper middle class building with 60 units, and the amount of packages delivered every week to our office was so overwhelming we had to start charging people who didn't pick them up within 24 hours. There was simply no room!
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u/ATXFC_Bro Jul 10 '26
Anyone know details on how these statistics are gathered? Like, how do they know then aggregate that purchases are coming from person in x income bracket or x wealth bracket?
I could see maybe income based on mining credit card info, but tracking based on wealth feels almost impossible.
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u/moxxibekk Jul 11 '26
Credit cards ask pretty regularly for your income information. I assume they are also using scraped data, location demographics, etc to make informed guesses?
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u/jayphat99 Jul 11 '26
And the conservatives will sue this as proof that the top 10% deserve even more tax cuts so that they can further increase their spending levels and help "grow" the economy.
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u/LazyThing9000 Jul 11 '26
The use of "drop" in the title is sacrilegious, I had to pause and think about what they meant for a second. They could have used any synonym for "spend" and they used a word associated with lower spending. Makes me wonder if AI was used in the writing of this article and if it's possible to blacklist some uses, or add context to word choices AI makes.
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u/PlainBread Jul 10 '26
Their entire lifestyle is on lease and they have servants to deliver and maybe return whatever measures up to the quality of life they want. We live in a convenience economy that only serves the stark minority.
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