zlacker

>>Anon84+(OP)
Google are really firing on all cylinders recently. It's almost shocking to read all they've done in the last year.

The fact they caught up with OpenAI you almost expect. But the Nobel winning contributions to quantum computing, the advances in healthcare and medicine, the cutting edge AI hardware, and the best in class weather models go way beyond what you might have expected. Google could have been an advertising company with a search engine. I'm glad they aren't.

>>fancyf+6d
Meanwhile the economy is tanking. But yeah what a fantastic year it is to be a company worth trillions.

>>10xDev+8g
> Meanwhile the economy is tanking.

NYT: US GDP Grew 4.3%, surging in 3rd Quarter 2025 - https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/23/business/us-economy-consu...

WSJ: Consumers Power Strongest US Economic Growth in 2 years - https://www.wsj.com/economy/us-gdp-q3-2025-2026-6cbd079e

The Guardian: US economy grew strongly in third quarter - https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/dec/23/us-economy-...

>>andsoi+lo
I think we should start separating discussion of “The Economy” from “human prosperity and wellbeing.” Because they are essentially two different things, only slightly related. The Economy can grow wildly while normal people are poor, suffering, and barely holding it together. I don’t care if corporations are doing great or if the GDP is high, if everything I need costs 3X what it used to and Im not sure if I’ll be employed next week.

While you are probably right in that The Economy, technically is growing, it doesn’t feel like it to normal people I know.

>>ryandr+9v
> I think we should start separating discussion of “The Economy” from “human prosperity and wellbeing.”

Do you think Americans' prosperity and wellbeing is tanking?

We can still look at quantitative and qualitative data.

The Economist ran a story in July "What is the richest country in the world in 2025"[1] in which they compared economies in three different ways: GDP per person at market exchange rates, Adjusted for price differences, and Adjusted for prices and hours worked.

Against those three metrics, the US is ranked in 4th, 7th, and 6th positions.

Even these statistics may need further interpretation or further adjustment (the article does a great job explaining why adjustments are needed for places like Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Ireland, Luxembourg).

> While you are probably right in that The Economy, technically is growing, it doesn’t feel like it to normal people I know.

Pew's research shows that most Americans rate the US economy negatively, with a strong partisan divide. 44% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents rat the economy as excellent or good (up 8 points from April) while only 10% of Democrats and Democratic-leaners say so.

Arguments for "better off" than, say, 3 years ago: strong job market, economic growth, reduced debt burden.

Arguments for "worse off" than, say, 3 years ago: high cost of living.

Notwithstanding the pessimism and the visible fact that people are not as economically strong as a pre-pandemic (but certainly much more than 2007 - 2008), I don't know that I would say the US economy is "tanking" OR that Americans are becoming destitute.

[1] https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2025/07/18/what-is-...

>>andsoi+5y
I don't have access to read the article, but I wonder if they are looking at the median or the average. Averages don't tell the complete story like distributions do. When you just measure averages, a room with 1 person who has $10M plus 9 people who have nothing has the same prosperity as a room with 10 millionaires.