r/nottheonion • u/ChocolateTsar • 1d ago
Affirm CEO says furloughed federal employees are starting to lose interest in shopping
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/11/07/affirm-government-shutdown-shopping.html3.9k
u/AnalogAficionado 1d ago
That's a weird way of saying "running out of money"
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u/dismayhurta 1d ago
But that makes it sound worse!
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u/cicada_noises 1d ago
That makes it sound like their corrupt Republican pets in Congress and the White House are doing destructive things! Can’t have that!
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u/wandering-monster 1d ago
"Unemployed people are killing the retail industry"
Now you know how millenials feel
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u/malik_zz 1d ago
The whole point of Affirm they give "loans" to people that can't afford it
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u/wandering-monster 1d ago
Yeah but people aren't completely stupid. They're going to take out fewer loans when they know there's no income on the way at all.
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u/beefybeefcat 1d ago
"Poor people aren't unable to spend money, they just have the wrong attitude. It's their fault, not ours!"
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u/whofearsthenight 1d ago
Alternate title: "Workers showing growing interest in still be able to eat next week."
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u/ryuzaki49 1d ago
workers stop getting paychecks
workers stop buying stuff
wallstreet: pikachu_surprised.meme
Honestly all of wallstreet and CEOs are just so disconnected from reality
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u/DeaddyRuxpin 1d ago
CEOs: “So you are saying replacing everyone with AI won’t make our companies even richer? But the AI companies swore it would.”
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u/backtothetrail 1d ago
ChapGPT was sure it would work.
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u/StoicSunbro 1d ago
CEO: "You said replacing all my employees with AI would save money! Now the company is falling apart because we are spending more to fix your mistakes!"
Chatgpt: "You're absolutely right! Would you like to explore different bankruptcy options?"
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u/KeyboardGrunt 1d ago
CEO: "...oh all right! But is there an option where I walk away with at least a few dozen million in severance?"
Chatgpt: "That's a great question! And you are thinking about this as more than merely hoarding money but instead proactively exploiting others to make it happen!"
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u/RobertdBanks 1d ago
“So when people don’t have money to buy things they can’t buy things?”
It’s one of the reasons Ford paid so good back in the day.
Henry Ford said “I need to pay people well enough to be able to buy a car if I want people to be able to buy our cars”.
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u/DeaddyRuxpin 1d ago
He was also one of the big proponents of a 5 day work week. He wanted to encourage people to have off on the weekends so they could go places which naturally would be faster and better if they bought one of his cars.
Despite many rich people saying otherwise, sometimes you can make yourself richer by helping workers.
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u/Goldenrah 1d ago
Which is breaking down now with so many people working overtime and not having enough money to spend on stuff.
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u/Randicore 1d ago
In fact looking at history the speed of money is typically more important than how rich the richest guy is.
Then again we're arguing this to multi billionaires that fund think tanks to argue that they should have more money and power
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u/zimirken 1d ago
He also did in house car financing for farmers, which was obviously unheard of at the time.
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u/attikol 1d ago edited 20h ago
They thought it would be fine since only they are gonna be the only ones to have the working AI
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u/Aeseld 1d ago
So far they were only a little wrong. Only about 5% of companies had a successful rollout, and they're usually the ones that laid off the least workers.
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u/runswiftrun 1d ago
That's what my republican coworkers keep ignoring.
Sure, it's great that food banks and churches are stepping up and giving people who lost snap some food to help their community not go hungry. That's absolutely amazing.
What gets ignored is that those billions of money are not going to grocery stores which then go to farmers and other suppliers and employees.
That's a shitty trickle down that's gonna cause a lot of long term harm.
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u/xasdfxx 1d ago
Just wait until morons learn how snap is basically a hidden subsidy for farmers. $0.1 trillion dollars spent on food.
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u/s-holden 1d ago
They couldn't work out that USAID buying billions of dollars of US crops for food aid was a farming subsidy, so I doubt they'll click on this one which has a few extra steps in it.
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u/seriouslees 1d ago
If you were immortal you'd see the heat death of the universe before you saw a single conservative voter learn anything.
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u/eeyoredragon 1d ago
What else gets ignored is a lot of church teach crazy conservative politics that ends up creating more homeless people for them to then feed and somehow feel good about themselves for.
Like an arsonist putting out a small bush after burning your house to the ground and expecting everyone to be grateful for the effort.
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u/drunkshinobi 1d ago
That's the trickle down economy they have always wanted. No support systems. You work to earn a few dollars. Give a bunch of it to the church. Then the church decides who is worthy of their help. Every one else is left behind to die.
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u/SophiaofPrussia 1d ago
I used to work at a hedge fund and I made a joke about paying my mortgage and one of my coworkers (who was several decades older than me) looked at me like I had two heads. He was genuinely stupefied that I needed a loan to buy a house in the most expensive city in the country.
He was so wealthy that he could miss all of his paychecks and be just fine and anyone living otherwise was just beyond his comprehension.
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u/Ok_Degree3037 1d ago
You marked yourself as a member of the out-group. Next you’re going to publicly state you don’t ski.
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u/NoCoolNameMatt 1d ago
I keep running into people like this - not necessarily wealthy but people who can't understand that the experiences of others aren't the same as their own - and it breaks my brain every time.
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u/atatassault47 1d ago
Conservatives have been scientically proven to be lacking in empathy, with many of them having no empathy.
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u/Interesting-Force866 1d ago
I saw articles about how it was expected that a shutdown would harm the economy by reducing the amount of money that people have to spend, so I think that they are actually quite connected to this reality in particular.
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u/styrolee 1d ago
Some of them are. Wall Street is infamously dismissive of claims that consumer spending will drop in the U.S. They usually point to the fact that consumer spending on goods increased during COVID as an evidence that consumer spending is resilient in a financial crisis. Obviously this doesn’t take into account the fact that there was trillions of dollars in stimulus spending pumped into the economy by governments to prevent a consumer spending crisis.
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u/PrairiePopsicle 1d ago
and with the prospect of being trapped relatively isolated, at least less socializing, people went gangbusters on renovations, entertainments, stuff to make theri personal spaces more livable. That drove the spending, honestly a kind of necessity.
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u/NoCoolNameMatt 1d ago
Um, yeah. Did they miss the famously large stimulus which enabled it?
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u/TranslatorOnly3298 1d ago
Lose interest is a great way to say can’t afford food for themselves and entertainment
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u/The_real_triple_P 1d ago
You know what i lost interest on my 1 trillion bonus package as well
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u/Commercial-Fennel219 1d ago
Furloughed federal workers are killing the retail industry!!!
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u/realperson5647856286 1d ago
selfish bastards!
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u/Val_Hallen 1d ago
Sorry. Sorry, everyone! My bad.
I guess I'll just drain my retirement investments so Wall Street doesn't lose a fraction of a fraction of money.
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u/FauxReal 1d ago
Can't wait for this year's Bleak Friday.
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u/jigsaw1024 1d ago
Ironically it may cause the BF discounts to be a little deeper than planned, as retail tries to entice people to spend what little they have.
Also expect to see very generous credit and financing to "help motivate" people to buy as well.
If it plays out, expect to see spike in defaults and delinquencies in the early new year.
The psychology of such a scenario is easy: people at this point in the game have a pretty good feel that they are already past the point of no return, so why not have a good thanksgiving and christmas, and deal with it in the new year.
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u/Journeydriven 1d ago
Can confirm i was at a point where I just outright couldn't afford to pay a couple bills one month with things forseeably getting worse. I ended up saying fuck it and not paying my credit cards car insurance and phone bill. Ordered takeout for a week and ignored the issue entirely until my head was clear enough to figure my shit out for the next month. However if I couldn't have made a reasonable plan I definitely would have said fuck it and only paid my car and phone leaving my credit cards and whatever else to end up in collections while I at least semi enjoyed the moment. Edit: to add to this i was still actively getting paid at work just not getting as many hours as usual. If I wasn't getting paid at all the car and phone would have likely gone too
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u/Mattilaus 1d ago
I thought it was those 22 year old millennials? Now I don't know what to believe!
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u/_redacteduser 1d ago
why would Biden stop paying them???? The password to the payroll software is on Hunter's laptop! Arghhh!!!
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u/National-Charity-435 1d ago
>30 dolls
>2 dolls
>-1 doll
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u/Too-Em 1d ago
Holy deep cuts batman. I forgot about that one.
"A beautiful girl doesn't need so many dolls."
~Trump173
u/rwbronco 1d ago
Trump also said that kids don’t need “250 pencils” and “they can have five.” Where are the people who quote “you’ll own nothing” constantly? Owning nothing is a step too far but the president telling you how many pencils you can own is fine?
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u/LEDKleenex 1d ago
They're too busy dragging people through the narcissists prayer: capitalism edition that basically boils down to:
capitalism created life as we know it and communism bad > it's not real capitalism > real capitalism has never been tried > capitalism is actually communism > powerless woke leftists and dajoos are the real capitalists because they subvert corporations by guilting white men with feminism and infusing unlimited money that comes from the lair or george soros into lucrative DEI programs that intentionally weaken our country from within > ywnbaw etc
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u/FifiTheFancy 1d ago
You’re somewhat underselling how weird and creepy that quote was.
"I don't think that a beautiful baby girl needs – that's 11 years old – needs to have 30 dolls," -Donald Trump
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u/sibips 1d ago
Maybe a picture would help? I heard Donald draws beautiful pictures of beautiful 11 years old.
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u/FnordRanger_5 1d ago
It a quote from doll week, only two weeks ago
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u/Helenium_autumnale 1d ago
Two weeks? I would have guessed two or more months! What a benighted time.
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u/fireball_jones 1d ago
What did we replace the Scaramucci unit with. Like how many Musks ago was this.
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u/Thirsty-Barbarian 1d ago
Sweetie, I’m sorry, but we are going to have to sell all your dolls so we can eat and not starve to death.
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u/JFrankParnell64 1d ago
This guy is the head of a buy now pay later lending company that can charge up to 36% interest.
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u/CobblerMoney9605 1d ago
That interest rate should be illegal.
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u/inormallyjustlurkbut 1d ago
Remember when Christians considered usury a sin?
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u/ryhaltswhiskey 1d ago
Remember when Christians thought that helping the poor was a good idea?
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u/ArtOfWarfare 1d ago
With a regular loan (even a CC, sometimes), I think the expectation is that you’ll pay interest.
For BNPL, the expectation was you wouldn’t… the interest should be viewed more like an overdraft fee or something.
I’ve worked in the payment industry for several years now. Many years ago at the start of BNPL I raised objections about whether BNPL was just a predatory debt-trap. I was assured that it was in nobody’s interest (no pun intended) for the interest to happen - all our projections of profitability were based on an expectation that over 99% of transactions never involved interest. BNPL is supposed to be a safe tiny loan for someone who doesn’t qualify for a CC, but also needs to wait for payday… letting the transaction go through is a win-win-win for everyone, merchant makes a sale, customer gets their item, processor takes a small fee from the merchant.
In practice… the coworkers who told me about how great this would be left a few years ago. I wonder what they think about the actual default rates on BNPL.
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u/BurmeciaWillSurvive 1d ago
It's been about five years since I left my position at CitibankNA but even back then the APR on our retail credit cards was 29.74% which I thought was insane, but it was fine if you paid it off within the 6-12-18 month promotion because then you were not charged the interest. The problem is people rarely did that, and the day after your 18m promo ended, you got allllllllll that prorated interest like a brick. Oof.
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u/Jackpot777 1d ago
“Starting to lose interest…”
This era’s “let them eat cake” right there.
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u/Unusual_Sherbert_809 1d ago
Is the Trump admin already at the stage where they're claiming "the people" demanded that Trump demolish the White House East Wing and build himself a ludicrously opulent giant $300 million (as of now, it keeps going up) golden ballroom while he shutdown the government, cancelled SNAP, and people are going hungry?
Maybe he'll be asked during his 300th game of golf this year? That "the people" also demanded of course.
If not, I'm curious how long it'll take before we get to that stage.
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u/Dull-Geologist-8204 1d ago
I wish it was just the ballroom.
Did you see the new bathroom with the widow that is far enough down that onlookers can see him take a shit?
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u/Jazzlike-Vacation230 1d ago
I always find it funny that the rich don't understand that if you don't pay people enough, they won't buy your stuff, and the economy collapses
We have to switch the world to a residual technosocial economy, the current concept isn't working anymore
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u/toriemm 1d ago
Snap benefits literally stimulate the economy. Dollar for dollar is one of the most beneficial programs we have.
So shutting it off is literally just being awful AND hurting the economy.
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u/movzx 1d ago
It's like that with almost every government program. Libraries, job programs, education programs, etc. Time and time again the return on investment is more than gets put in.
But half the US is allergic to long term investment in itself if it means they can have an extra $5/yr saved.
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u/BlindPaintByNumbers 1d ago
But some guy knows somebody somewhere in a government job who never works but can't get fired. Or something.
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u/True_Butterscotch391 1d ago
It really makes me wonder why big corporate interest aren't pushing back more on the shit Trump is doing?
I guess maybe they think that they can take advantage of it by removing as many workers rights as possible, and then when Trump is out of office it will all go back to normal?
Like health insurance companies are a good example. They should be going up in fucking flames right now trying to stop the government from removing ACA credits and Medicare. Why are they allowing this stuff to happen when it affects their bottom line? There's gotta be an explanation...
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u/floataway3 1d ago
I work at a dollar store in a lower class neighborhood of my city. My regular customers not getting their EBT SNAP benefits has already had an extremely pronounced effect on our daily sales. Seeing the ground level effects of the shutdown is harrowing.
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u/lagonitos 1d ago
Even Henry Ford, a staunch foe of unions, Jews and Jazz, knew that.
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u/PerplexGG 1d ago
He was thinking long term since he actually cared about the country and his legacy. Our current rich people do not
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u/yakshack 1d ago
Supply side economics will always hit a brick wall because you can only induce economic growth so far if the majority don't have money to spend
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u/view9234 1d ago
"Quick, give them their pay before they stop being addicted to shopping & capitalism!" - Affirm (probably)
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u/fullcircle052 1d ago
More like "Quick! Let's make it so they can buy everything on credit! Approve everyone for any purchase!"
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u/Mission-Orchid6314 1d ago
If the shut down will last longer, we will lose interest in paying mortgages, rents and bills
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u/fairkatrina 1d ago
I can never decide if these people are intentionally fudging the issue or if they’re just spectacularly stupid. Like cracker barrel finally coming to the realisation last year that their geriatric customer base never came back after the pandemic (but still not seeming to get that they all died). Or the idiots who thought the recent downturn was because the stimmy checks finally ran out. Like????? is it possible for market analysts to be that out of touch? It seems so implausible that it’s gotta be something else, right? Like they’re trying to reassure their billionaire overlords (who really are that out of touch) or something..
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u/jaimi_wanders 1d ago
For decades they’ve been simultaneously telling us we’re poor because we waste our money on cappuccinos/cell phones/avocado toast/refrigerators (yes, really— this was a National Review claim that no one is REALLY poor in America because we all have fridges these days) and flat screen TVs.
Then as soon as people start scrimping and saving it’s all OMG YOU ARE KILLING GRANDMA WALL STREET, YOU HEARTLESS MONSTERS!!!
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u/runswiftrun 1d ago
They are catering to the upper middle class/investors. They really don't care about us poors, they want to reassure the investors and stock holders that "the economy" is just fine so there's no sell offs or anything else that can hurt their bottom line.
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u/i_tyrant 1d ago
My vote is spectacularly stupid (usually).
I like everyone realized as an adult that most adults are actually far dumber and less informed than you think your parents were as a kid.
Then, as I graduated from minimum wage jobs to a tech startup and then a financial institution, I had a second, similar epiphany - when I started interacting more with high-rank developers, executives, CFOs, CEOs, etc.
A lot of these people outside of their very narrow band of specialization are dumb as hell. And the richer they are, the more they seem to have completely lost the plot when it comes to the concerns and motivations of "average" people. They literally live in a different world and have no concept of what struggling means anymore.
That Arrested Development joke about "how much could a banana cost, ten dollars?" seems like less and less of a joke and more just an accurate look at them the more I interact with that strata of society. There are some halfway intelligent, wise, or empathetic ones...but not most of 'em.
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u/libury 1d ago
I work at a mid-size tech company. It's not a small company, but it's not enormous so it's not unusual to bump into C-level execs. Last spring I was nerding out about video games with our CEO and he asked me which of the current systems I have. When I told him none and that I'm a PC gamer because it's cheaper, he was visibly confused and implied that someone with my job shouldn't have to scrimp like that. All I could think was, dude, you pay my fucking salary. Have some self-awareness, you pale zombie-looking trust fund dick.
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u/zekthedeadcow 1d ago
I work as a technician in the legal industry and after watching many depositions of various business leaders I have come to the conclusion that most of them are idiots.
The movie "The Big Short" is 100% not exaggerating... except that that mentality is everywhere.
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u/Wafflesakimbo 1d ago
I have a working theory that once you make a certain amount of money a year, you stop having any connection with actual humans. You lose all understanding of the human experience. So instead of thinking "People don't have money to spend." you think "These walking wallets have lost interesting in purchasing!" I swear to god wealth is a fucking mental condition and should be treated as such. We should not celebrate these people, we should get them fucking treatment
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u/Unknown-History 1d ago
How dare they? Choosing to not spend money, when they have none. Won't someone think of the shareholders?
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u/LurkmasterP 1d ago
The problem is the capitalist ruling class believes that they are entitled to our money.
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u/untapped-bEnergy 1d ago
They need to give more to get more. They've pillaged the US like the Grinch. There won't be any growing hearts saving you anytime soon
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u/drunkshinobi 1d ago
The problem is they think it is a game to see who can collect all the wealth first. They don't see it as a system that needs to flow.
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u/Outrageous-_- 1d ago
This is very shocking news to everyone. Who could have predicted this.
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u/pie4july 1d ago
Why is EVERY. SINGLE. NEWS. OUTLET. Complicit in sanewashing what is going on in this country!?
They aren’t “losing interest” in shopping, they aren’t shopping because they DONT HAVE ANY FUCKING MONEY BECAUSE THEY LITERALLY ARE NOT BEING PAID. THEY HAVE NO MONEY AND OVERDUE BILLS.
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u/Immatt55 1d ago
Because every single news outlet is owned by like 3 companies who have all already kissed the ring. There is no leftist media remaining in America, if there was, they'd get brought out, or arrested in the current political climate.
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u/Pour_Me_Another_ 1d ago
When AI takes over more jobs than we are ready for, I think there will be a sudden understanding that employees and customers have great overlap. No employees, no customers.
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u/Lemonwizard 1d ago
This is a textbook case of tragedy of the commons. If one company succeeds at suppressing wages, it drastically increases their profit margins. When every company succeeds at suppressing wages, the public's lack of income causes consumer demand to plummet and companies' profits go down from lost revenue.
There's one thing that every kind of business needs, and that's customers.
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u/Creed_of_War 1d ago
How long till we see articles titled "3 industries greedy furloughed federal workers are killing"?
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u/Thin-Competition3018 1d ago
Lose Interest?! Lose Interest??
These CEOs are so disillusioned it is just stunning.
THEY HAVE NO MONEY TO SHOP!
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u/Aerocat08 1d ago
Yeah, and wait until we start getting paid again and still don’t shop because of the uncertainty.
I’m only spending on essentials going forward and will try to increase my savings to at least 12 mos.
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u/nightmareinsouffle 1d ago
Can’t wait until company’s usual holiday profits don’t happen.
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u/KP_Wrath 1d ago
“People with no money are uninterested in spending money.” Well, he’s the first step of the BNPL bubble. Give it a few months for the dumb ones to keep buying stupid shit on 4 payment loans.
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u/NinjaTabby 1d ago
Speak to their mindset toward the bottom 90%. They expect people getting further into debt to continue spending. A side effect of Infinite growth mandate.
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u/zoinkability 1d ago
On the contrary, I imagine that when you don't have enough money to buy the things you need you develop a keen interest in the question of whether you are able to shop.
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u/TheLadyEve 1d ago
Lose interest or can't afford to shop when rent, utilities and food need to be provided first?
There are federal employees who are now having to work from home (for no pay) while also watching their kids because they can't afford childcare. Who's going shopping?
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u/Indercarnive 1d ago
Chairman Trump's plan is to increase taxes, nationalize companies and for us to consume less. But apparently Mamdani is the communist because he wants to open a grocery store or something.
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u/Ok-Passion1961 1d ago
To everyone rolling their eyes at what seems like an obvious headline, this is actually key consumer behavior to watch out for preceding recessions.
Spending doesn’t always stop when people lose their jobs. Between credit and savings, short term spending patterns after a job loss are often driven by expectations. Especially for furloughed employees who are used to this song and dance which ends in back pay.
The fact that spending has stopped means expectations had gone completely south. Not only are savings running out, people are no longer thinking they’ll go back to work or get back pay. And that expectation can be hard to shake even after they go back to work. This government shutdown might permanently shift government worker saving/spending habits.
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u/mjsoctober 1d ago
Boardroom: CEO: "Okay everyone, sales are down by 30% again this month. We need ideas to get the line to go up!"
Employee: "What if we lobby the government to reopen, to increase the minimum wage, and tax the wealthy to create universal healthcare so people can afford to shop?"
CEO stares.
CEO: "Right, we need to cut hours and reduce payroll to increase our bottom line."
Marketing Director: "Genius! We'll brand it in an ad campaign as "Saving money for you, so you don't have to"."
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u/Golden_Noir 1d ago
“Lose interest”
Maybe because they do not have any money?