Proposal: The American Misery Index

[KamaAina]

We have all kinds of numbers to show us how great the economy is supposed to be. The Dow Jones. The unemployment rate. And so on. But how about a way to measure how much suffering is actually going on out there? What would its components be?

To start, I'd say:

Population in homeless shelters
Amount of food distributed at food banks

Others?

[NYC_SKP]

1. The executive pay to average pay to minimum wage ratios.

Portion of income going to healthcare.

I don't know if food banks are alone a great indicator, but collective benefits for nutrition might be useful; food banks, shelters, EBT and school free lunch numbers as individual items and as a portion of the population.

[BlueJazz]

2. People with no health insurance, Number of people requiring food stamps.

[chervilant]

3. How many unemployed

people have just given up on finding a job, how many people are working two or more service industry jobs to get by, how many applicants per job opportunity, how many parents or elderly skipping meals, how many people cashing in retirement funds to get by... I could go on and on.

It's *REALLY BAD* out here in the 'burbs and in rural America.

[Duer 157099]

4. Percent income spent on

housing (including utilities, the often hidden costs)

[KamaAina]

5. Well done, all of you!

[okaawhatever]

6. Sadly, you were beaten to it. The misery index is a real thing and is calculated each year. I think

you should rename what your index as what you are wanting to measure is important. We could have the republican index, or the one percent index, or the tea party index which could be the number of people who starve/reduction of food stamps.

heres the wiki def of misery index:

The misery index is an economic indicator, created by economist Arthur Okun, and found by adding the unemployment rate to the inflation rate. It is assumed that both a higher rate of unemployment and a worsening of inflation create economic and social costs for a country.

[KamaAina]

8. Suffering index?

That other one sounds like it came from the 1970s, the era of "stagflation".

[KoKo]

7. People who used to have a few treats...a vacation...something to look forward to..

There's just so much turmoil and uncertainty about the future plus having to deprive oneself of some of even the little pleasures of life because of fear of not having enough in case there's another downturn in the economy looming.

[KamaAina]

9. But how would you quantify that?

Second-home ownership wouldn't do because so much of it is the 1%. Total entertainment spending?