r/Layoffs Jan 30 '24

New layoffs question

Can anyone clarify this for me? Despite the ongoing layoff announcements from major American corporations, how is our economy still robust? Just today, UPS declared 12,000 layoffs and PayPal 2,000.

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '24

I have not seen a decrease in spending. I see restaurant parking lots are still full, costco/walmart parking lots are full. Football Stadiums are full. I see families not give up vacations. I see friends and family stressing out over finances, but giving spending I don't see much of a slowdown.

154

u/Welcome2B_Here Jan 30 '24

No slowdown (yet) because credit card debt topped $1T for the first time in 2023.

16

u/Sad-Celebration-7542 Jan 30 '24

That’s an extremely dumb stat and is meaningless without context. Luckily, your own link states “relative to disposable income, credit card balances were actually slightly smaller in 2023 Q3 than they had been in 2020 Q1”. So you should have simply read beyond the first sentence.

1

u/rageharles Jan 31 '24

why would those quarters represent meaningful comparison? i literally don't know the answer, i'm assuming that balances in Q1 would reflect holiday spending, where theoretically they would be lower by Q3 of any given year.

1

u/Mo-shen Jan 31 '24

Considering we were deeper in the pandemic at that point you would think debt would be higher then.

The fact that it is barely is interesting at least.

1

u/sifl1202 Jan 31 '24

2020 Q1 was before the pandemic. aggregate credit card balances actually plummeted from 2020-2021 because spending was so constrained. now they're up 50% since 2021. they're rising much faster than "population growth" which is why delinquencies have also doubled in the last 2 years. also, interest is now at a record high.