In addition to the $3,250-a-month rent which included a gardener, internet and utilities, remote workers were on the hook for an additional $200 monthly work-from-home fee. The rent was already high. Then came the $200 work-from-home fee – https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2026/07/30/remote-work-rental-fee-sparks-outrage/91101669007/
Yikes.
Manhattan led the city with the median asking rent jumping 9% ($427) in a single year to reach $5,117. Brooklyn recorded the second-biggest annual spike of 5.9% ($225), as the median rent rose to $4,054. Queens followed closely with rents rising 5.6% to $3,561 from last year. Fresh College Grads Face NYC’s Toughest Rental Market Yet as Asking Prices Surge to 7-Year High – https://www.realtor.com/news/trends/college-grads-toughest-rental-market-nyc-july-2026-rent-report/
Yikes.
Americans of all ages now spend far more time on screens, crowding out time that might otherwise be spent with a book. This trend too shows a similar socioeconomic divergence: Specifically, adults with high school education or less are four times more likely to be smartphone-dependent (24%) than college graduates (6%). A Generational Collapse in Reading – https://www.demographyunplugged.com/p/a-generational-collapse-in-reading
Yikes.
Source – The Class of 2026 is cooked https://www.semafor.com/article/05/15/2026/ai-has-contorted-the-job-market-for-twentysomethings-leaving-college-this-may
Source – https://layoffs.fyi/
“I think the junior level is definitely finding it harder now to enter the workforce,” said John Romeo, who leads the consulting firm’s research arm, the Oliver Wyman Forum. “It’s those mid- and senior-level employees that CEOs are now looking at to drive productivity.” That’s because of the types of tasks that AI agents are able to perform, from writing code at the level of a junior developer to evaluating sales leads. What the agents can’t do in many fields is make judgment calls using the insight that comes from on-the-job experience, according to labor experts. AI Poised to Tilt Job Market Leverage Toward Older Workers – https://finance.yahoo.com/economy/policy/articles/ai-poised-tilt-job-market-150000094.html
Yikes!
If you managed to scroll down this far here’s a bonus video.
YIKES
Interestingly, older workers (65+) earn around $3,000 more than those in the 25 to 34 bracket, reflecting a group of late-career professionals who continue to command strong wages. Charted: Median U.S. Salaries by Age Group https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-median-u-s-salaries-by-age-group/
Late-career professional. There seem to be a lot more of us now.
Three in four workers (75 percent) plan to work for pay in retirement, compared with just 29 percent of retirees who report they have actually worked for pay in retirement. In fact, the RCS has consistently found that workers are far more likely to plan to work for pay in retirement than retirees are to have actually done so. 2025 Retirement Confidence Survey – https://www.ebri.org/retirement/retirement-confidence-survey
But if you’re working for pay in retirement how can this be considered retirement?
Source: https://www.axios.com/2025/09/11/trump-tariffs-grocery-prices-rise-cpi
FYI, the BLS statistics are BS. Real world eyeball prices at the market tell me so.
Like coffee. Coffee prices in the US has surged more than 20% in the last year.
US coffee prices surge as tariffs take effect – https://www.semafor.com/article/09/12/2025/us-coffee-prices-surge-as-tariffs-take-effect
Ooh…not just coffee.
Here’s the inflation breakdown for August 2025 — in one chart – https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/11/inflation-breakdown-for-august-2025.html
I guess I’ll keep working in “retirement”.
How Bad Could This Get? https://awealthofcommonsense.com/2025/04/how-bad-could-this-get/. I’ve lived through several stock market crashes. And to think I started the day reading up on the latest U of Michigan healthy aging poll.
- Have financial stability (78%)
- Save for retirement (65%)
- Get access to health insurance (59%)
- Support family members financially (52%)
- Maximize Social Security benefits (46%)
Link: https://www.healthyagingpoll.org/
How about adding these bullet points to the list:
Disclaimer: the additional bullet points are fictional and not related to the real poll questions or answers.
Monday should be a very interesting day in the stock market. Stocks appear to be headed towards a fire sale. Time to buy!
These problems have existed for decades. Rampant government spending and massive government borrowing are two important factors. The government has defaulted on its debt nine times. Argentina’s currency was devalued by 30% in 2015, and then again in 2016. Soon after taking office in December 2023, Milei devalued the peso by more than 50%. https://tipswatch.com/2025/03/23/horror-stories-of-inflation-in-argentina/
Who Holds the Ballooning US Government Debt, even as the Fed and Foreign Holders Unloaded Treasury Securities in Q4? — https://wolfstreet.com/2025/03/18/who-holds-the-ballooning-us-government-debt-even-as-the-fed-and-foreign-holders-unloaded-treasury-securities-in-q4/
Maybe one day I’ll add my personal thoughts when I post stuff but for now I’ll let Scary Charts speak for themselves.
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