The capitalist economic crisis continues to weigh heavily on the backs of working people despite upbeat reports from the White House and the business sections of the boss press.
It is true the capitalist rulers and their upper-middle-class hangers-on are enriching themselves through stock market speculation, buying and selling luxury items and otherwise enjoying the perks they think they’re entitled to, while the working class continues to feel the squeeze from high prices for groceries, rents and mortgages, health care, electric bills, car payments and more.
At the same time, it’s become increasingly difficult for workers to get and keep a decent-paying job, as a growing number of bosses at some of the country’s biggest companies are slashing workforces. U.S. bosses eliminated 1.2 million jobs last year, the highest annual figure since 2020 during the COVID pandemic.
UPS announced Jan. 27 that it is cutting 30,000 jobs this year, in addition to the 48,000 the company eliminated in 2025. Amazon is laying off 16,000 employees, three months after cutting 14,000 workers in the fall. Verizon began laying off more than 13,000 workers in November, its largest reduction ever. Dow Chemical is cutting 4,500 jobs, after axing 2,300 workers last year. Tyson Foods said it is closing a plant that employed 3,200 packinghouse workers in Lexington, Nebraska, affecting nearly a third of that town’s population.
Those of us who find ourselves out of work are having an increasingly difficult time getting another job. Some 26% of the 7.5 million on the government’s unemployment rolls have been looking for work for over six months. And millions more are no longer counted, chopped off as “discouraged,” not in the labor market.
“More than half of workers have less than three months of living expenses saved up in the case of a layoff,” a recent USA Today survey said. “Nearly a third only have enough to last one month.”
The bosses are reaping big profits off the backs of working people. “The portion of the U.S.’s economic output that workers receive through salary and wages decreased to 53.8% in the third quarter of 2025,” gloated Fortune magazine, the lowest level since the Bureau of Labor Statistics started keeping these figures in 1947. Meanwhile, corporate earnings have skyrocketed, hitting a record $1.87 trillion in 2024 for Fortune 500 companies, with bloated CEO salaries.
The capitalist rulers say this reflects increased “productivity,” with fewer workers producing more while getting less and less of the wealth we produce. Workers call this speedup, with a real toll on life and limb.
Health care premiums skyrocket
Particularly daunting is the cost of health insurance. From the start of this year premiums rose, most dramatically for millions who signed up for coverage under the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare.
“Lenny and Mandee Wilson, who are 47 years old and live in Charleston, W.Va., paid $255 a month last year for a low-end ACA plan,” said the Wall Street Journal. “Late last year they learned their bill would be going up to $2,155 a month, a sum nearly triple their monthly mortgage payment of about $760.”
So, they dropped their insurance. “If we step off the ladder wrong and make a trip to the ER,” Lenny Wilson said, “that would pretty much wipe us out financially.”
Prices for both new and used cars are rising, along with interest rates on loans to pay for them. Many workers end up owing more than their vehicles are worth. This spirals into higher debt payments when they try to trade in the old car for a newer one. A record number of car buyers today have monthly payments of $1,000 or more.
The price of keeping a roof over your head is also going up, by more than one-third since 2021, to a median home price of nearly $400,000. Together with high mortgage rates, many young people find themselves unable to move out of their parents’ place in hopes of beginning to raise a family.
But never fear, some people are finding new digs. “Sales Over $10 Million are Skyrocketing,” headlined a Jan. 29 Wall Street Journal article. The paper runs a column called “Mansions,” featuring huge homes on vast estates. The number of these homes that went for over $10 million in 2025 rose nearly 32% over the previous year.