Americans are spending $800 just to cool their homes. We are at a breaking point | Mark Wolfe

S ince 2020, the stock market has more than doubled. Americans who own substantial financial assets are reveling in economic success. For everyone else, the economy feels very different. This summer, the average family will spend nearly $800 just to keep their home cool, almost 40% more than in 2020 and up 10.5% since last summer. Americans now carry more than $1.2tn in credit card debt. Nearly 60% say they are living paycheck to paycheck. One in six households is behind on its utility bills. Every year, utilities disconnect electric service more than 13m times . Nearly 40% of lower-income households struggle to pay their energy bills. Yet if you listen to the Trump administration, the economy is booming because of rising stock prices . The problem is that record stock prices and record corporate profits tell us a great deal about how wealthy Americans are doing and very little about ordinary families. For millions of Americans, the economy isn’t measured by the S&P 500; it’s measured at the gas pump, in the grocery store and when the monthly electric bill arrives. And those bills keep getting bigger. At the National Energy Assistance Directors Association, we’re used to helping low-income families struggling to keep the lights on and the heat and air conditioning running. What worries me today is how many middle-class families are facing the same pressures. Families who thought they were doing everything right. …