Can you provide a single metric that's bad right now? Employment is close to a record high, PPP median income is up. Housing cost isn't great, but homeownership rates are still as high as ever. It's mostly vibes that are down.

Edit: the parent also called out median comp being up. Again, the persistence of the negative vibes without any actual data reinforces how the media now negatively impacts everyone's attitudes and ultimately mental health

It does seem that US COLA-wages are growing more slowly than Europe (though better than Canada), while our stock market outperforms. So one could make a claim that more profits should go to labor, rather than capital.

Some numbers (all the usual "mean-vs-median" caveats apply, though IME it rarely changes much):

France mean wages (2001-2022): 41706/26275 = 1.59 (2.2%/yr)

France CPI (2001-2022): 108.74/80.39 = 1.35 (1.4%/yr)

GB mean weekly wages (2001-2022): 599/321 = 1.87 (3.0%/yr!)

GB CPI: 114.6/73.5 (2001-2022): = 1.56 (2.14%/yr)

Canada mean wages (2001-2022): 14,176.4/10,405.1 = 1.36 (1.5%/yr)

Canada CPI (2001-2022): 146.3/96.8 = 1.51 (2.0%/yr)

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/time...

https://www.statista.com/statistics/416204/average-annual-wa...

Things are still getting better though. One can be jealous that too little gets shared, but it's looking up for everyone. This is great!