#oh and hobbies aren't supposed to be side hustles btw

[oxenfreeao3]

There aren't many hobbies out there that are free to do, inherently creative, and capable of bringing joy to people all across the globe.

But that's why I love writing fanfiction.

[anyu-blue]

No.

It IS a resounding NO.

Because Covid is STILL killing swaths of people, we just aren't masking (outside of individuals like myself who do) or giving it media attention anymore. And it's mutated (as we were warned it would) so vastly were still not sure we can keep up or prevent it with vaccines.

LONG Covid is impacting almost everyone I know. My household had a confirmed case ONCE because of ONE encounter we were supposed to be able to trust, and we're still not the same years later.

And, sure, the unemployment rate HAS gone down and good things have been set in motion, HOWEVER- most of us are barely scraping by as cost of necessities keep rising by the week and is WHY unemployment has gone down. No one can afford to house another person without a job anymore- making the sick/disabled and the unfit enter the workforce at greater numbers. Because they have no choice. Disability is not enough. Side hustles/ money-making hobbies aren't enough. Literal CHILDREN are being hired (sometimes under the table)!! These all skew the numbers.

I'm honestly sick of seeing my coworkers do price changes- CHEAP shoes currently START at $20. Cheap 'decent' shoes start at $50. Our minimum wage is $10/hr. Do the math of how much of your life it takes to keep buying work shoes- which you're supposed to replace every 8 months - let alone groceries. It used to cost us $150 for a weekly trip. Now for the SAME STUFF, it's $400. So we scramble to find alternatives- anything to knock the cost of FOOD down. Its f*cked with my IBS and food intolerances VERY badly because I'm just trying to eat whatever is cheapest. And its that, or go hungry.

Oh, but despite being sick, we can't go to our hospital because it's full of people who are too tired not to make mistakes OR people who are there for the paycheck and nothing more. And even if we DID go, the co-pays and then costs of that care are higher than ever. $100 WITH INSURANCE (that's also at least $100 a month before co-pays and deductibles) for a generic medication? WTF?

Have I even mentioned the homelessness rate in our state? It has SKYROCKETED while ALSO now being criminalized because there's just so many people in the previous safe havens that they can't hide from the public eye and now authorities-- which leads to overcrowding and, you guessed it, furthering disease in any available housing these desperate people (who ARE working btw- usually because of a grandfather clause or managing to find a way around the 'needing an address' problem some other way.) can find. They just can't afford a home, OR to KEEP their home as the housing prices and property taxes keep going up as well.

A good Gen X friend of mine is terrified she'll lose her house due to these very taxes. She has a cancer treatment she takes (which also costs an arm and a leg) and can only work part time as a teacher because of the side-effects. That doesn't pay a lot.

OH! And that doesn't even touch the fact that we're seeing a genocide and unintentionally helping to pay for it with our damn taxes AND whatever damn company also supports it that sells a product we don't have an alternative but to buy from that brand.

Most of the people I know that fall into those lovely, easy to read numbers and statistics are NOT doing better at ALL. We're INDIVIDUALS, FAMILIES, entire COMMUNITIES who are struggling under the weight of it all while big wigs and jerks who only look at the superficial data and NOT the actual quality of life PEOPLE have get to say we have it SOOO much better than we did 4 years ago.

We don't.

SOME things are better... on paper. The reality is much more dirty than that. It's so, so ugly.

Get off your fucking high-horse, get your nose out of the damn data, and listen to the people's answers.

It IS a resounding NO.

(This isn't a rag on Biden btw. He's imperfect and not helping in some areas, but I DO recognize we are better off than under Trump. HOWEVER, what that man did while in office, AND the stupid ideas it gave to the power hungries STILL in office is part of why we are so absolutely not doing well right now. It takes time and good teams to undo the problems caused - and a lot of the good that SHOULD be here or looks good on paper isn't actually good rn is because of that ripple effect too.)

1. Morning in America

Without irony or embarrassment, Elise Stefanik asks, “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?”

And then Stefanik claims that the answer is “A resounding no.”

AYFKM?

Let’s do this. And I mean, let’s really forking do it.

First, let’s start with the baseline. What was it like four years ago?

At this point in 2020, a few hundred Americans were dying every day from COVID. By April 2020 that number would be over 2,000 dead per day.