📈Stocks Are Soaring While Americans Are Miserable sad😭
The U.S. is experiencing one of the most striking disconnects in financial history. Consumer sentiment just hit its lowest level in 70 years of survey data, 10% below even the grim June 2022 inflation peak, while the S&P 500 notched its eighth consecutive weekly gain and the Dow hit back-to-back record closes.
Making the divergence even more striking is valuation: the S&P 500’s cyclically adjusted price-to-earnings ratio stands at 40.8, a level only seen once before in 145 years of data, during the dot-com bubble of 2000.
Economists offer three possible explanations for the gap, and all three may be simultaneously true. First, stocks may simply be wrong, dangerously disconnected from economic reality and headed for a sharp correction.
Second, markets may be looking past current pain toward a future where the Iran war ends, inflation eases, and growth rebounds, essentially pricing in an optimistic scenario consumers can’t yet see.
Third, AI may be the common thread driving both trends at once: a world where companies use AI to slash labor costs and widen profit margins is fantastic for shareholders, but deeply unsettling for workers worried about their jobs.
May 29, 2026 334 1
