GDP per capita, consumption per capita, disposable income per capita, unemployment, economic policy uncertainty, VIX and destitution index – plus median household income.
Figure 1: GDP per capita today (blue) and four years ago (tan), both in billions of 2017 SAAR dollars. Source: BEA.
Figure 2: Consumption per capita today (blue), four years ago (tan), in $ SAAR 2017. Source: BEA.
Figure 3: Personal disposable income per capita today (blue), four years ago (tan), in $SAAR 2017. Source: BEA.
Figure 4: Current unemployment rate (blue), four years ago (tan), in percent. The April observation matches the Bloomberg consensus. Source: BLS.
Figure 5: VIX now (blue), four years ago (bronze). Source: CBOE via FRED.
Figure 6: Economic policy uncertainty index (blue), four years ago (tan). Source: Policyuncertainty.com via FRED.
Figure 7: Poverty index now (blue), four years ago (bronze), in%. The unemployment observation in April corresponds to the Bloomberg consensus, inflation comes from the Cleveland Fed nowcast for 04/30/2024. Source: BLS, Cleveland Fed and author’s calculations.
I don’t have a time series for the real median household income index, but I can compare the March 2024 value to the February 2020 value (which Motio’s research suggests is the likely peak) of 115 ,8.
Source: Mobility research.
I would say that, based on these measures, the answer is “yes,” even using median income.
