In case you forgot, this is a K-shaped economy

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Marketplace

News, Business

4.8 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 8 December 2025

⏱️ 8 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

First up on the show: Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, says the economy is doing well. After all, consumers are chugging along, and the stock market is continuing a strong run. But that feeling of "doing well" isn't even across the board, and those on the lower end of the income spectrum are feeling pinched. We'll discuss, and later we’ll explore how this is playing out in the restaurant scene, too.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Is the economy doing quite well? I'm David Brian Caccio in Los Angeles. The CEO of the biggest of banks was on TV this weekend, sounding fairly content about the state of the U.S. economy. Let us parse this further with economist Julia Coronado, who's founder of macro policy perspectives. Good morning. Good morning. Turns out life is pretty good, economically speaking.
0:22.5	I don't know if you saw this, but the CEO of J.P. Morgan Chase, largest of banks, Jamie Diamond.
0:28.5	His assessment was this. In the short run, it looks like the American consumer is doing fine, is chugging
0:35.4	along. Companies are making profits, stock markets are
0:38.1	high, and that could easily continue. There are a little small negatives, you know, like jobs are
0:44.3	weakening, but just a little bit. Inflation is there and maybe not going down.
0:49.8	Julia, is your current economic assessment in sync with what Jamie Diamond is saying?
0:56.5	Well, economists tend to worry a little bit more maybe than bank CEOs. The weak labor market is a big source of concern.
1:04.9	We've seen private sector job losses, public sector job losses. The unemployment rate is creeping higher. In fact,
1:12.8	that's one reason that the Federal Reserve is probably going to lower interest rates later this
1:17.4	week is that they're worried about the economy too.
1:20.7	Jamie Diamond pointed out that he's worried that prices are not going to go down.
1:24.7	I mean, inflation is prices going up, but the question of does it go down, a few see that as a possibility?
1:31.9	That's right. That's the other conundrum, especially for the Fed, is inflation has been sticky. It's been higher than their target of 2%. And that is also hurting Americans. There's something we call the K-shaped economy,
1:46.5	where high-income Americans who can, you know, have buffers of savings, are doing fine and
1:53.9	feeling the tailwind of the stock market, but the middle and lower income consumers are the ones
1:59.5	who really get pinched by this sort of
2:02.6	stubbornly high inflation.
2:05.1	Our central bankers start meeting tomorrow and then have their interest rate decision the day
2:09.2	after.
2:10.3	I mean, interest rates will go down a little bit, I suppose.
2:13.1	Yes.
	...

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