Will Smith is releasing a new album. It's “Mamma Mia!” Return to Broadway. There is an increase in law school applications.
And it's absolutely a break in spring in Houston.
As the financial world has been nervously watching the fall of the S&P 500 over the last few weeks, noexperts and chronically online shows signs of a recession in daily activities and choices. For them, the recession is like visiting an Asian elephant exhibit at a nearby Houston Zoo instead of traveling to Asia. Or increasing interest in tort law and a decline in creative films.
Posts by X and Tiktok with the hashtag #RecessionIndicator are jokes and even cheeky insults about activities that are mostly considered cheap. But they also reflect public interest in how pop culture and trends are affected by economic uncertainty, experts say.
The sequel is a simple target for the “recession indicator” label. For some, the announcement of the fourth season of “Ted Lasso” or the sequel to “Freaky Friday” shows the studio tightening the strings of their wallets rather than illuminating risky, innovative material in green.
“It's kind of funny to think of Jason Sudeikis struggling to pay off his third pool, so he's like, 'Time to get your mustache back!”,” podcast producer Rob McRae said, referring to the actor who plays the title character of the show.
Of course, movies, TV shows and albums are pitched and planned before they are released, slowing down economic indicators. If anything, the songs and films that released this line may reflect today's economic situation.
“We may be booming in two years, but we will see scars from this,” Kenneth Rogoff, a professor of economics at Harvard University, said in an interview. “We're now seeing the decision that was made a few years ago.”
A better measure of consumer concern may be their habits. “If you collect alcoholic beverages, will you be using the remaining liquor at the end?” asked one X user. The questions quickly became trending feed and were widely distributed. One popular replies was “Yes, even before the recession.”
Professor Rogoff laughed at the hypothesis, but this scenario felt unlikely (indicating that he had never partyed with a journalist). But the truth is that people tend to eat less when they are worried about the recession and spend less on gifts.
The #RecessionIndicator meme is, in many ways, a repackage of well-known academic theories. Take the “hemline index” which assumes that the skirt will become longer as the economy slows down. Hair length and chocolate sales have also been analyzed as a reflection of consumer sentiment.
Terry F. Pettyjoh II, a professor of psychology at the University of Coastal Carolina, has spent more than 20 years studying how the economy affects people's decisions.
“When social and economic times are more challenging, we prefer music with slower, more romantic and more meaningful lyrics,” Professor Petty John said in an interview this month. “And when times are good, we prefer music that is brighter, more fun, meaningless lyrics.”
It's not a perfect system. The top song for 2008 was the dance party anthem “Low” by Flo Rida. Have you ever heard that listeners say, “The stock market is low, low, low, low, low, low, low”?
Sometimes even brighter music incorporates themes from the moment, such as Timbaland's 2007 song “The Way I Are,” and “I aaaaaa no money.”
Today's music charts are filled with slower, more meaningful songs and ballads, reflecting economic tensions, Professor Petty John argued.
He named Billie Eilish's “Feather Bird” and “Wildflower,” with examples such as “Die with a Smile” by Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars. Certainly, Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars are extremely popular artists, and their songs may have spent 30 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, regardless of their economic background.
However, the overall mood change has become more clear.
This month, Dokii's song, first released in 2019, landed on the Billboard Hot 100. title? “Anxiety.” Beat? It was sampled from the 2011 hit song “Someone I Know.” Well, it's basically a sequel. #RecessionIndicator.
