The Spiritual Implications of a Recession
Soul Gum
by Victoria Hutchins
4.9 • 560 Ratings
🗓️ 13 April 2025
⏱️ 34 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The tariffs won’t just affect your wallet—they’ll also affect your soul. In this episode, we walk through 5 spiritual side effects of an economic downturn (per Abraham Maslow, Karl Marx, and Simone Weil). Then we’ll talk through 3 philosophically-rooted tips for tending to your soul during (yet another) unprecedented time. Are the people wearing milkmaid dresses to the club a recession indicator? What would Karl Marx think about you hating your coworkers who won’t stay late at the office? How can we prioritize spirituality at a time like this without being navel-gazey? Let’s talk about it.
EPISODE OUTLINE
00:00 Intro
03:16 5 spiritual impacts of a recession
03:45break
06:39 1. Accessing spirituality gets harder
06:52 Maslow’s hierarchy of needs
08:37 Simone Weil and Simone du Beauvoir clash
11:05 Everyone’s an existentialist until the rent is due
12:31 2. Resurgence of traditional faith systems
12:39 Hemline index
13:36 Moral panics during recessions
13:52 Today: trad wives, homesteading and Catholic core
14:28 The link between economic security & decline of religious affiliation
16:33 3. Disconnection from nature and each other
16:58 Karl Marx’s 1844 paper on alienation of labor
21:23 4. Escapism becomes more tempting than ever
21:44 Lipstick index
22:40 TikTok restock videos as a recession indicator
23:10 Alcohol sales during recessions
23:54 TikTok shop dupe culture as a recession indicator
24:35 5. We’re ripe for spiritual expansion
25:42 The god shaped hole (Pascal)
26:27 3 practical tips for spiritual health during a recession
26:42 1. Other people are not your competition
27:28 “Be kind to people and ruthless to systems”
27:40 2. Tactile hobbies and reconnecting with the fruits of our labor
29:38 3. Spirituality during hard times is best served pragmatically and people-focused
31:58 Challenge: noticing me versus them moments
MY LINKS
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• Find me @thedailyvictorian on TikTok
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The tariffs aren't just going to affect your wallet. |
| 0:03.8 | They're also going to affect your soul. |
| 0:07.6 | Let's talk about it. |
| 0:10.7 | Soul gum. |
| 0:12.1 | Welcome back to SoulGum, the self-development podcast with philosophical, psychological, and spiritual flair. |
| 0:19.8 | I'm your host, Victoria Hutchins. My goal is to give your soul |
| 0:24.6 | something to chew on. And today, we are going to talk about the spiritual implications of a recession. |
| 0:35.1 | It has never been more impossibly expensive to be alive than it is right now. |
| 0:42.5 | 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Credit card debt is at a record 1.2 trillion. And this is all |
| 0:51.0 | despite a record number of Americans having more than one job. |
| 0:55.5 | It is impossible to leave the grocery store without spending like $100, even if you didn't do a full grocery shop. |
| 1:01.9 | In 2014, a McDonald's quarter-pounder with cheese costs $5.39, and last year, it cost $12. |
| 1:10.7 | I remember being scandalized in college that a burrito and chips |
| 1:14.3 | and a drink from Chipotle cost $13. And my exact order that I used to get all the time in college |
| 1:19.7 | now costs, wait for it, $25. It costs $25. Uber has conveniently developed this cute new feature where whenever you try to call an Uber, it says, |
| 1:33.2 | oh, actually your Uber is seven years away. Yeah, it's seven years away, unless you would like to pay more |
| 1:42.1 | money. Would you like to upgrade, in which case it'll be |
| 1:45.6 | five minutes away? And we're just hoping you don't remember that it used to be five minutes away |
| 1:49.9 | without you having to pay extra. We are in an age of corporations offering the illusion of new deals, |
| 1:57.6 | like, don't get me started on the basic economy flight fairs, when really they are just |
| 2:03.7 | figuring out new ways to charge us more while offering us less, while cutting more corners. |
| 2:10.6 | Allegedly, for all of that, don't sue me, McDonald's or Chipole or Uber or airlines. |
... |
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