The Squeeze

“It’s the economy, stupid.” – James Carville

I went back to work recently. That was always the plan to be honest: I would take six months off to write the book and then find a part-time job to help stretch out my retirement savings and help keep us flush to afford the things we wanted to do – like live sporting events and concerts. I like my job for the most part. I mean, as I’ve always said about working, it’s called work for a reason, but there is a lot to be grateful for, including that I got a job at my age, and I am. And I realize I’m doing better than many. But I am also facing a reality that is not too pleasant. In the six months I was living strictly off a monthly allowance from my retirement, I went from having no credit card debt and some short-term savings to having balances on all my cards, and my savings drastically drained down. Gas prices were a factor to be sure, but not the whole story by any means. Where I personally really felt the pinch was at the grocery store and my utility bills. We’re a household that runs on routine and habit: we buy the same staples on repeat, so it was easier than it might have been otherwise to see how costs were leaping (not inching) up week after week. I started having to dip into savings to make the allowance I had last from week to week. Then we got hit by an unexpected expense in April, and I didn’t have enough savings left to cover it. I took out a short-term loan instead. Now I have a loan payment to contend with, and groceries, gas and utilities keep right on climbing up. That’s when I started using the credit cards to cover when things got tight. Yesterday I got another unexpected bill, and I just sat at the kitchen table for a while, looking at all my balances, trying to move things around like a dysfunctional puzzle but the parts don’t all fit. I had no idea at the time, because I had been at work, that President Trump had sat in his gilded Oval Office surrounded by billionaires earlier in the day and had the nerve to say that no one talks about how we have “…the best economy we’ve ever had.” I was glad I didn’t know, frankly. I was depressed enough, thinking that my newish job might not be enough to just keep us solvent.

There are a lot of people sitting at kitchen tables or desks across the country, trying to do the exact same thing I was doing. And they don’t have the options I do. I stopped to chat with a woman a little younger than I am recently who was holding a clipboard. Turns out she was listing all the things she could bear to part with and how much she thought she could get for them so she could afford Christmas presents. Within the small team I work with, more than half of them have more than one job. I asked one of them if he ever had time for fun, and he admitted that there wasn’t much down time. They all come in faithfully and work hard. They don’t complain. It’s a good group who exhibit the kind of work ethic Americans like to tout. They deserve to have the money they work so hard for stretch far enough to give them some security.

These are anecdotal stories admittedly. It’s hard to determine how many American families are in fact living paycheck to paycheck. The numbers I looked at varied, but CBS News and CNBC, in 2024 and in July 2026 respectively, landed on a figure of 25%. Other sources have the number higher. No one lists it lower. However, the Urban Institute reported that, “…49 percent of people in American families don’t have the resources to cover essential expenses to live securely[1].” And they have a wealth of data they have been tracking over time to back that up. Other recent studies that have questioned Americans on their perception of their financial stability report that three-quarters of us are nervous about our finances.

Is this all at the feet of the current administration? No, it’s not. But they must shoulder a large share of the blame since rising costs are linked to tariffs and trade disruptions. I would even look to the administration to answer to some of the food shortages due to extreme weather, given their record on climate change, which Donald Trump has scoffed at in the past. Despite stating that “affordability” is a made-up word, I believe Trump is aware that voters are anxious about the economy. He rode into this second term banking on their dissatisfaction with the Biden administration’s handling of it, for one thing, but he also played into it by offering up the $5,000 bribe if we voted to keep the Republicans in power. If anyone might be tempted by that offer, which I personally doubt would come to fruition, let me remind you that it would be our money he’s offering to pay us, since it would be funded by taxpayer dollars, and that huge expense would have to be made up somewhere and somehow. But it’s a short-term stopgap, even if we got it. We can recoup far more than $5,000 by being able to make a living wage, by ending a war that is keeping gas prices inflated, by providing decent and affordable healthcare for all, and by ending head-scratching tariffs with our own allies. Sound simple? Doubtless it’s not, but my vote is going to go to representatives who will at least work toward those goals, and not the party who is trying to tell me it’s not real and we’re in a golden age. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go try and sell some Penguins tickets.

[1] Jenkins, Wesley. Last Updated 2026, April 2. “The American Affordability Tracker.” Urban.org. https://www.urban.org/data-tools/american-affordability-tracker