Harris poll for Guardian finds people reconsidering major life events such as having children or buying a home
Americans are reconsidering major life events including marriage, having children and buying a home amid economic anxiety in the opening months of the Trump presidency, according to an exclusive poll for the Guardian.
Six in 10 Americans said the economy has affected at least one of their major life goals, according to the Harris poll, citing either lack of affordability or anxiety around the current economy.
Though Donald Trump’s tariff policies have only been in place for a few weeks, and though he has temporarily walked back on some of his harshest policies, the findings are a sign that Trump’s economic agenda could have long-term effects.
Rebuilding could take 10 to 20 years. If he’s shit enough it could take two to six.
If he does Herbert Hoover levels of damage there’s likely to be broad motivation to take heavy handed action to fix it. Re-nationalizing land, nullifying contracts, and disregarding the impact it has on those who invested money or otherwise relied on the changes. Some of the programs being torn apart today are direct responses to trying to fix the problems Hoover caused.
It’s not a lot, but it’s worth remembering that Hoover had a lot of similar stances to Trump. He made things so bad that America elected the closest thing we’ve ever had to democratic socialism, and people liked it so much that they elected him four times and Congress changed the Constitution out of spite.
It could take decades longer than even that. America has experienced mind-boggling collapse in just 4 months. The damage to its reputation will take an entire restructuring of the powers of the executive branch to overcome. I mean, who wants to make a deal with an admin, when every 4 years it can go back on its word?
We still have at least 43 more months to look forward to. The bottom hasn’t even begun to drop.
The compromising of things like voter data and social security databases has really disturbed me. Even if we have the best president in history next, how can we ever trust those systems again when an unknown number of people potentially have backdoor access to that info? I think a lot is going to need to be scrapped and rebuilt from zero if we’re supposed to have confidence in it. It’s not like the normal stuff like when we get a crummy EPA or FCC person and we can just roll some policies back or what have you, we have been severely exposed to unknown parties about many of the most private and personal levels.
It is one of the reasons why a civil war would actually do America good: for security’s sake, the non-fascist side would have to overhaul their systems.
This is the stupidest timeline, that the best solution to a problem lines up with social armageddon.
I really don’t want to see people crossing the line to war/terrorism. I guess it would be the fastest way to get impactful change, but likely at a high cost. Destabilization also seems much easier than establishing a new system that enough people are happy with without fracturing again. That’s also assuming the side we’re on comes out on top.
We don’t necessarily need something catastrophic to build back. We just need to seriously learn from the mistakes we’ve allowed, not just to smooth things over with words and by ignoring transgressions.
If we get a new Theodore and Franklin as our presidents, that certainly would be preferable. Unfortunately, I have the feeling that isn’t happening. Unlike those days of yore, we got a president who wants to be king, and cares not who else has to pay the price for it.
Best I can do for you right now is a slightly used Kamala and a Newsom. (sad laughter)
I was somewhat pleased the other day to see Andy Beshear being mentioned. I’m not an expert on Kentucky politics, but I used to listen to a show from Cincinnatti during Covid, and Basheer seemed to navigate issues in a largely red state well, and he seems to be on what I feel is the right side of many issues. Skimming his wiki page quickly, I don’t see any controversies, and actually a few more good things I wasn’t aware that he managed to accomplish.
There are still many powerful people with a lot to lose that I don’t think are interested in seeing the US go fully off the rails, plus the head of the MAGA cult of personality is an old and unhealthy person, so we may yet get to see the movement run out of steam naturally before it is too late. I’d like this BS stopped yesterday of course, but I don’t want a violent leftist government any more than I do a violent right government. I’m neither rich nor well connected, so either would be bad for me and the people I care about.
This certainly isn’t unique to the US. It may be more pronounced here at this moment in time but that wouldn’t have been true 20 years ago. The system hasn’t changed in that time. The same can happen anywhere else with the right conditions.
That’s very true. It’s less that it can happen, and more that it’s happening with virtually every trade agreement at once, along with dozens of diplomatic norms.
That said, the authority of the executive is undeniably stronger today than back then. Congress has acquiesed its authority and powers on virtually every issue imaginable and it alternates between being too complicit and too incompetent to change that (and too gridlocked to achieve meaningful policy anyway).
There are too many metastisizing issues to count at this point.
The soft power will take the longest to repair, but 40-50 years is a bit long. That’s on par with how long it took for us to build most of it in the first place.