Americans stressed – A CBS News poll finds 67% of Americans are actively stressed about money, with rising prices and swelling debt colliding with an economy where many have no savings. The result is a widening fear of going broke—and an anger that elites increasingly dismiss.
A red tomato cost 40 percent more than it did a year ago. It’s the kind of detail that might usually slide past people’s attention. But for Americans who say they’re already stretched thin, it lands like a warning—one more ordinary expense moving just out of reach.
This is the mood behind a CBS News poll released this month: 67 percent of Americans say they’re actively stressed about money. Fifty-five percent say their finances are getting worse, the highest share since Gallup started asking the question in 2001. The poll also found that two thirds of Americans haven’t been able to attend social engagements—birthday dinners. weddings. and holiday gatherings—because of financial limitations. and that most of those people. 55 percent. lied to friends and family about money being the reason.
The strain is showing up in daily decisions too. One third of Americans reported skipping meals or driving less to save gas money for health care costs in a survey conducted in mid-2025. Another one-quarter said they delayed surgery and other treatments because of cost. For many. even the smallest shocks can turn into emergencies: one-third of the country has no savings. leaving them unable to absorb even a $400 medical emergency. Nearly 7 out of 10 Americans are more worried about going broke than dying.
The price numbers are only part of the story. Gas prices are cited at more than $4.50 a gallon. with the text attributing that increase to “Trump’s pointless war on Iran.” Renting an apartment is described as 54 percent more expensive than it was in 2017. Housing prices are said to be up 60 percent since 2019. and families are expected to spend $120 more on electricity this year than they did in 2025. Credit card debt is described as up 63 percent since just 2021.
Behind the day-to-day arithmetic is a larger mismatch in how the economy is shared. The text points to extreme inequality. including claims that the top 10 percent of Americans own almost 95 percent of all stocks. and that nearly half of Americans have $0 in retirement savings. It also says the amount of wealth held by the top .1 percent is roughly equivalent to what the bottom 90 percent holds. and that the United States has the highest wealth inequality among G7 nations while having some of the worst economic mobility in the developed world.
It traces that concentration to America’s long history of unequal political power and economic exclusion. arguing that the exclusion of Black people. women. and other marginalized groups helped establish an ethos where austerity and disinvestment were normalized. It also describes an education system that propagated “bootstrap individualism” and a culture that elevated rare rags-to-riches stories as the achievable norm.
Even in plain compensation terms, the imbalance is stark. The text says the average CEO-to-worker compensation ratio was 20-to-1 in 1965. climbed to 58-to-1 in the early 1990s. and stood at 285-to-1 in 2025. For 20 companies that employ the greatest number of low-wage workers—including Walmart. Home Depot. Best Buy. Starbucks. and Amazon—the ratio is said to be just shy of 900-to-1. At the 50 public companies with the biggest pay gaps between worker and CEO. the text says it would take 1. 000 years for the average worker to make what their CEO brings home every year.
The most combustible tension, though, comes from the gap between those living the squeeze and the people dismissing it. Donald Trump called affordability concerns a “hoax,” during the holiday shopping season, in the text. He also recently stated he considers Americans’ gas prices and other economic woes “not even a little bit” when making decisions about the war in Iran. adding: “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation.” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is described insisting that while Americans “may be sounding grim. ” people in “their heart of hearts” feel good. dismissing what “they’re telling the survey people.” Republican congressman Jim Jordan is quoted responding to soaring gas prices with a verbal shrug: “That’s life.”.
David Lay Williams. a professor of political science at DePaul University and author of The Greatest of All Plagues: How Economic Inequality Shaped Political Thought from Plato to Marx. is quoted arguing that elite indifference was “one of the fundamental problems that led to the French Revolution.” He says the difference between then and a broader-sharing depression is that upper classes weren’t suffering. and that today’s extreme inequality “looks less like the Depression and more like prerevolutionary France.”.
That dismissive tone doesn’t land in a vacuum. The text describes viral moments that are less about policy details than about desperation. In April, a video of a young woman sobbing in her car went viral; she said, “I’m fucking stressed. We shouldn’t be working like this. I work my ass off and I can’t even fucking pay bills…can’t even pay my fucking rent.” In the same month. another viral video showed a 29-year-old Kimberly-Clark
warehouse worker in Ontario. California. using a lighter to set pallets of toilet paper on fire. “All you had to do is pay us enough to live,” he repeats off camera. The blaze quickly escalated into a six-alarm fire, spreading through a 1.2 million square foot warehouse. The text says 175 firefighters responded and the damages were roughly $600 million. It also says none of his 20 nightshift coworkers were injured, and that he now
faces seven felony arson charges.
The criminal complaint is described as citing a sample of texts and statements used by the fire-setter to infer motive: “I just cost these motherfuckers billions”; “1 percent is a fucking joke”; and “Pay us more of the value WE bring. Not corporate. Didn’t see the share holders picking up a shift.”
In both videos. the text says. the nerve is the same: panic. hopelessness. and frustration about an economy that doesn’t match the promise that hard work should guarantee survival. It points to a Wall Street Journal survey showing that nearly 70 percent of respondents said the American dream isn’t true or was never true to begin with—the highest level of disbelievers in 15 years. up 3 percent over one year prior. Only a quarter said they expect their standard of living to improve. It also cites an Axios description that the economic pessimism spanned across demographics. including men and women. older and younger adults. and those making more and less than $100. 000 in household income.
What comes next is a question this country has struggled with for years: when recourse feels unavailable. what happens to people’s anger?. The text argues that the infrastructure for peaceful economic democracy—especially unions—was ultimately no match for corporate greed. It claims the Economic Policy Institute has documented spread of union-busting. noting that workers at Starbucks. Amazon. and Trader Joe’s have faced multibillion-dollar corporations prepared to do whatever is “necessary. lawful or unlawful” to crush organizing campaigns.
It then points to a society where about 55 percent of homeless people have jobs. and it cites a poverty line of $31. 200 for a family of four based on outdated economic indicators from 1963. A viral economics essay is referenced for the claim that the “price of entry” to the economy—including childcare and healthcare—has increased exponentially.
From there, the text moves into the destabilizing question inequality can raise. Walter Scheidel. a Stanford historian and author of The Great Leveler. is quoted saying it’s “almost universally true” that violence has been necessary to ensure redistribution of wealth. He adds that massive and violent disruptions have a common root: disruption of the established order. The text also cites researchers finding more unequal societies have higher crime, especially interpersonal violent crime, and lower social trust. A 2026 Pew Research survey across 25 countries is cited for the claim that the U.S. was the only nation where more people described the morality and ethics of others as bad (53 percent) than good (47 percent).
A December 2025 study is described as concluding that inequality alone doesn’t always spark civil unrest. but inequality plus internet connectivity often does. with a tipping point at 50 percent internet penetration. It says examples range from the 2011 Arab Spring in Egypt and Tunisia to a recent “Gen Z uprising” in Nepal. and argues social media makes relative deprivation more visible.
All of it loops back to the lived experience the text keeps returning to: the feeling of being trapped while watching others spend as if the rules don’t apply. The crying young woman in the car is quoted saying. “they always say. ‘Don’t compare yourself to others. ’ but i see people going to Cochella and buying all types of shit—just pointless ‘fuck you’ money—and I’m over here. can’t even fucking pay my bills.” The text connects that moment to #Broketok. describing it as internet visibility of inequality in real time.
The friction between economic reality and elite dismissal is then paired with comments from billionaire figures. Kevin O’Leary is described accusing young workers of being “idiots” for “pissing away” money on daily coffees and $28 lunches instead of bringing lunch from home or drinking water. while also claiming that praise for billionaires’ philanthropy and job creation has been “lost in this narrative of inequality.” Elon Musk is cited as announcing he’s aiming for “10 trillion
or bust” and claiming in March that there should be more gutting of federal spending because it’s mostly “entitlements. ” which the text says refers to Medicaid. Medicare and Social Security. Musk is also described as claiming “20 million dead people and children” are being used to fraudulently collect Social Security payouts. Jeff Bezos is said to have argued against increasing taxes on billionaires by claiming doubling his taxes “isn’t going to help that teacher
in Queens. ” and he’s also accused politicians of “picking a villain” by criticizing poor—“ha. ha” billionaires.
The text also includes rebuttals to those claims: that O’Leary owns stakes in restaurants charging $12 for fries and $24 for salad; that Medicaid. Medicare. and Social Security aren’t “entitlements” but programs people spend their lives paying into—while the text says Musk has instead received $38 billion in corporate welfare; and that Bezos reportedly pays a lower effective tax rate than most of his warehouse workers. with one-third of workers paid so poorly they need help from programs like SNAP and nearly half reporting trouble making rent and buying food.
The immediate political point the story ends on is stark: if millions feel they’re being squeezed while leaders talk as if the squeeze isn’t real. anger doesn’t stay theoretical. Days after the warehouse fire video went viral. the text says someone in Colton. California. painted a wall with the slogan. “Pay Us Enough to Live.” It also references Luigi Mangione becoming. via a description attributed to Forbes magazine. “a folk hero. ” and frames that as tied to the growing perception of rich indifference.
As Trump is described as building an 800-square foot ballroom and a 250-foot arch flanked by gold eagles. and as Kevin O’Leary lectures on gratitude and brown bagging your way to buying a $1 million microstudio. the warehouse worker’s words are echoed again—“If you’re not going to pay us enough to live or not to afford to live. at least pay us enough not to do this”—before the text’s final reminder: “Never let it be said that the people did not warn you.”.
United States politics economy affordability income inequality CBS News poll gas prices credit card debt homelessness retirement savings #Broketok Donald Trump Scott Bessent Jim Jordan
A $400 emergency?? lol try $400 for toothpaste and gas now.
Wait so people are stressed cuz tomatoes cost more? That sounds like headline stuff. I get bills are high but tomatoes aren’t making me broke.
I lied to my sister too, not even cuz I’m embarrassed, just couldn’t afford it. But also $400 emergency feels like fake math like how are we supposed to even save? Prices up, credit card up, and then they’re like “just budget” like ok sure.
This is what happens when “elites” keep ignoring regular folks, sure, but also every time I see a poll it’s the same thing. Like tomato prices went up 40% so now everyone’s depressed? My cousin said it was the government shutting down stuff, idk. All I know is I can’t keep up and $400 would be gone in a day if my car sneezed.