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Comment by eli_gottlieb | Hacker News Reader

What would make you think the economy was doing well?

In my case, it'd be growing numbers of people being easily able to afford housing and medical care, with most people putting more of their money into savings. Right now we have soaring numbers of homeless people and record amounts of household debt so I don't think we're doing very well.

Actually I think this could be distilled to a simpler metric. The economy is doing well when the net wealth (not including tax advantaged accounts) of individuals and families is positive and growing in real dollars.

Because if you are able put money into savings or investments then you probably have the other stuff you listed.

If your net worth is tied up in your home (house rich, cash poor), you can't put that money into savings or investments. My house is "worth" 2X what I paid for it 11 years ago, awesome. It's not helping to pay the increase in taxes, homeowners insurance, groceries, that have gone up, up & up.

That's fair, excluding primary residence makes sense just like retirement accounts.

> The economy is doing well when the net wealth (not including tax advantaged accounts) of individuals and families is positive and growing in real dollars.

Tricky to account for differences in consumer culture, no? Because the number of people who consume all they earn, no matter how much that is, is not staying equal over time or location.

I wouldn't account for it at all both because I think it will shake out in the aggregate but also because if people are spending all their money immediately I think it signals low confidence in their future economic situation.

One good indicator could be how much worse it’s doing in a year after the likely trade war.

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