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I swear I'm not trolling but I keep seeing this "K-shaped recovery" term and I still don't understand how I'm supposed to see a K in these plots. Am I supposed to ignore the bottom-left leg of the K? Or was COVID initially benefitting low-income people somehow?

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There's not a good word for this shape: -<

So "they" seem to have settled on "K" for it.

Thanks for confirming that. I assumed that the downturn was supposed to be part of the shape too, by analogy with earlier(?) terms like "V-shaped recovery", but I guess not.

If I can suggest an alternative, what about "Y-shape" where you tilt your head a little bit so that the bottom of the Y points slightly to the right? (Edit: after googling this it seems I'm not the first to propose this.)

Forked recovery. As in 'we are forked'.

Unicode to the rescue: 𝈄 or ≺

I hate to say "benefitting", but on a purely financial basis it was - average household income rose 10% in April due to stimulus checks and increased unemployment benefits.

I've heard that too, but the effect doesn't seem to have been large enough to show up in any of these plots I've seen (including in the linked post). Did I miss one where it's more clear?

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