An article in the NYT last week that was equal parts accurate, poignant, and depressing told us how Disney uses information it gets from smartphones to craft an extremely enjoyable experience only for those with huge amounts of money to spend, because that is where the profits are. It is a portrait of a nation with a disappearing middle class. It is a description of the dollar store economy at work.
As I’ve noted countless times before, Biden’s attempt to shatter the dollar store were defeated by inflation and a lack of votes in the Senate. Trump is attempting to break out of dollar store bondage with a very different program, featuring mass deportations and tariffs. It is unlikely that the tariff levels that he has selected and/or negotiated are sufficient to bring about a massive improvement in the lives of poorly educated workers, so their hopes will have to ride on labor shortages created by the deportations. Is that likely to work, or will we instead see vegetables rotting in the fields and small business closures due to a lack of suitable employees? My money is on the latter.