Why It Might Not Feel Like the Economy's Recovering

In Massachusetts, new numbers show the state's median income rose in 2015, poverty went down and unemployment hit its lowest point since 2001. Economists say the numbers suggest the recovery is truly taking hold, yet as our Patch readers can attest, it doesn't feel like it to many people. Why?

Patch spoke to our readers and academic experts to help break down the answers to that question, and to look at how such data might be manipulated in a presidential election year.

The numbers don't tell the whole story.

Boston College Professor Kay Schlozman has this saying she likes: "A man and a dog have an average of three legs." And they sure do, but that doesn't tell you much about men or dogs.

"Averages obscure people who are doing really well, and people who aren't doing better," she told Patch.

They can also provide only so much context. A higher percentage of people may be employed, but those numbers reveal little about the quality of that employment. Does it pay well? Is it stable? What are the benefits like?

Similarly, declining poverty numbers could indicate low-income individuals are being employed at greater rates, but might also suggest they are taking on second jobs, additional part-time employment or otherwise working longer hours.

They don't tell everyone's story.

It's been said the United States is experiencing a "spotty" recovery, and that statement is true even within Massachusetts. The state's overall unemployment rate hovers just below four percent, but in Lawrence, that percentage is more like eight. WBUR recently explored how Lawrence and other "Gateway Cities" are playing catchup in this economy. You can listen or read that story here.

Likewise, a positive trend in the number of people in poverty sounds great on paper. However, a closer look at those numbers reveals that one group is left behind: seniors, where greater numbers were in poverty in Massachusetts in 2015 than the year before. That's according to new numbers released last week by the U.S. Census Bureau.

They tell a short story.

Boston College Professor Tiziana Dearing was among those taking a hard look at that census information, and taking note of what it didn't say.

As she told Patch in an email, the Census Bureau itself points out certain limitations.

For example, "... while things improved from 2014 to 2015, that was the first year they had done so since the recession, and, people still have not recovered to pre-recession income and poverty levels. In addition, wage stagnation had been in place since well before that recession. So arguably, some people are still not in a place they were in the 1990s," she wrote.

Stagnant wages mean that even as costs of goods and services rise around us, our annual raises or ongoing bonuses have remained relatively flat. And many of us still remember how it used to be.

"It's not hard to imagine, then, that they would feel things really aren't improving," Dearing said.

One Framingham Patch reader put it this way in an email:

"People cannot understand why they just received a $5k bonus or pay increase, but still feel like they are falling farther and farther behind in their bills. ... (A) $1,500 median wage increase per year doesn't matter if your next two electricity bills will equal that."

Additionally, recent census data points to good news, but represents only one year, rather than a well-defined, long-term trend with demonstrated staying power.

It's also a matter of perspective.

As that Framingham reader wrote, "Everyone I know is struggling right now - most turning to credit/debt to stay afloat."

Even if the numbers suggest the recovery is taking hold, hearing that means nothing when you can look to your own bank statements or your friend's debt load and see the limits of that on-paper economic growth.

Separately, there's what Schlozman refers to as the "relative deprivation phenomenon." For example, you may be doing better now than you were in the mid-2000s, but feel differently once you look up from the umpteenth roof repair on your creaky old home, only to see the luxury condos going up next door.

"If they live next to very affluent people," Schlozman says, "even if people are doing pretty well, they look at that and don't feel like they're improving."

And, of course, it all gets politicized.

In an election year, these numbers and their limitations get wrapped into the broader national debate, then distorted through the prism of talking points and advertising blitzes that comprise presidential politics.

Schlozman, who has studied the ties between personal income and political voice, says that every party in power does its best to co-opt good economic news into its own message.

That means it's in the Obama administration's interest to take credit for any economic improvement; it's in Hillary Clinton's interest to assure voters she'll continue that legacy; and it's to Donald Trump's benefit if he can poke holes in those numbers and explain how much better he'd do. It often leads to exaggeration and outright fabrication (in Trump's case, the mathematically untenable claim that U.S. unemployment rates are, in fact, as high as 42 percent.)

But who you believe goes back to that matter of perspective.

If you're inclined to trust Democrats, positive trends in the census data are more likely to sound true to you; if you're in the Republican camp, you may see them as suspect.

But even more important than political affiliation is the reality you see around you.

Politicians ignore voters' valid economic frustration and disillusionment at their own peril. Trump cannily recognized this early, and his attention to those concerns arguably helped win him the primary. As she moves into the general election, Clinton has increasingly been angling her message toward that constituency as well.

The other half of her widely criticized "basket of deplorables" comment spoke to voters who feel economically disenfranchised.

"That other basket of people are people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they're just desperate for change," Clinton said. "... Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well."

She may also be coming around to those talking points after the stiff primary challenge she faced from Bernie Sanders, an Independent whose message of economic inequality propelled him to unanticipated heights.

Schlozman says that positive economic news generally benefits the party in power and "on net, will not hurt Democrats." Those experiencing tough financial times, by contrast, tend to engage in retrospective voting, Schlozman says; they look backward to brighter economic times, and are more likely to be swayed by the candidate who promises a return to better days.

In the heat of campaign season, it may be best to step back from the rhetoric and ask a worthy question: "How much can a single candidate actually influence my economic future?"

In the end, this isn't an issue of politics or of numbers on a page: it's about what you and your family experience. Please consider sharing your story and your perspective by writing for us, or by writing to us, at alison.bauter@patch.com