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Once again, how people are feeling about this economy is pretty much everything.

From American Public Media, this is Marketplace.

In Los Angeles, I'm Colin Rizzdall. It is Thursday today, the 12th of June. Good as always to have you along,

everybody. There's a bunch of data points I could rattle off to get us going. Wholesale inflation is

fine. Continuing claims for unemployment benefits are up. The dollar is getting whacked. But we're

going to go instead with one of our standbys. The reality that all the data in the world doesn't matter until you know how people are feeling in their economic day today.

Marketplace's Kristen Schwab has a series she's been doing for us.

It's called lived economies, how people from all over this country are living and spending and how they are feeling about it.

Here she is with today's installment.

Long Island is the birthplace of suburban America.

And you can still sort of feel that when you drive around here in Farmingdale.

Vinyl-sided houses, freshly cut lawns and American flags.

Bill Thompson looks over at his neighbors.

You look down the block here, and everybody that owns a house has a union affiliation.

Okay? This guy over here. Joe, he was Verizon. He gestures down the street.

Electrician, police officer, truck driver, Long Island Railroad.

Lots of blue-collar jobs.

That includes Bill, who is a sheet metal worker, mostly installing duct work.

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