That’s despite economic data showing cooler inflation, steady income gains, and resilient consumer spending.

But according to Michael Green, chief strategist and portfolio manager for Simplify Asset Management, conventional gauges don’t capture how much Americans are struggling with the cost of living, even households earning six figures.

In a viral Substack post last week, he took particular aim at the federal government’s poverty line, which traces back to the early 1960s and was calculated by tripling the cost of a minimum food diet at the time.

“But everything changed between 1963 and 2024,” Green wrote. “Housing costs exploded. Healthcare became the largest household expense for many families. Employer coverage shrank while deductibles grew. Childcare became a market, and that market became ruinously expensive. College went from affordable to crippling. Transportation costs rose as cities sprawled and public transit withered under government neglect.”

Meanwhile, a two-income household is now needed to maintain what one income once provided, but that incurs childcare costs and the need for two cars.

As a result, the poverty line’s narrow focus on food leaves out how much other expenses are now sucking up incomes and lowballing the minimum amount Americans need to get by.

Green estimated that food comprises just 5%-7% of household spending, but put housing at 35%-45%, childcare at 20%-40%, and healthcare at 15%-25%.

“If the crisis threshold—the floor below which families cannot function—is honestly updated to current spending patterns, it lands at $140,000,” he added. “What does that tell you about the $31,200 line we still use? It tells you we are measuring starvation.”

‘The Valley of Death’

At the same time, Americans who are below Green’s version of the poverty threshold are still falling behind, even as they climb the income ladder.

That sets up a perverse disincentive as the poorest, by contrast, aren’t penalized with mounting burdens when support is taken away.

“Our entire safety net is designed to catch people at the very bottom, but it sets a trap for anyone trying to climb out,” he explained. “As income rises from $40,000 to $100,000, benefits disappear faster than wages increase. I call this The Valley of Death.”

Lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic offered a respite for many families because working parents didn’t pay for childcare or gas to commute while working from home. Stimulus checks also added to their incomes.

But after the economy reopened, those costs came back and inflation surged. And while it has come down drastically since 2022, overall price levels didn’t come down and remain high.

“This mathematical valley explains the rage we see in the American electorate, specifically the animosity the ‘working poor’ (the middle class) feel toward the ‘actual poor’ and immigrants,” Green said.

The anger doesn’t stem from racism or lack of empathy, he added. Instead, it’s more about resentment at the government.

“When you are drowning, and you see the lifeguard throw a life vest to the person treading water next to you—a person who isn’t swimming as hard as you are—you don’t feel happiness for them,” he said. “You feel a homicidal rage at the lifeguard. We have created a system where the only way to survive is to be destitute enough to qualify for aid, or rich enough to ignore the cost. Everyone in the middle is being cannibalized.”

Life is expensive

To be sure, Green acknowledged his calculations are based on costs in suburban New Jersey. His threshold is also above the median household income for a family of four in 37 states, according to the Washington Post.

But Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Living Wage Calculator and the Economic Policy Institute have also put family expenses in some states at more than $100,000 a year.

Meanwhile, financial strains from the higher cost of living also help explain why discount retailers like Walmart have reported seeing more upper-income customers shopping at their stores.

In Green’s view, the point is that food is relatively affordable, notwithstanding higher grocery prices lately. Life overall is what’s expensive.

“The real poverty line—the threshold where a family can afford housing, healthcare, childcare, and transportation without relying on means-tested benefits—isn’t $31,200. It’s ~$140,000,” he wrote.

His Substack post also echoed a recent survey from the Harris Poll that showed many Americans earning six figures, even $200,000 a year, are privately struggling.

Among the findings was that 64% of six-figure earners said their income isn’t a milestone for success but merely the bare minimum for staying afloat.

“Our data shows that even high earners are financially anxious—they’re living the illusion of affluence while privately juggling credit cards, debt, and survival strategies,” Libby Rodney, the Harris Poll’s chief strategy officer and futurist, said in a statement.

MBW Views is a series of op-eds from eminent music industry people… with something to say. The following MBW op/ed comes from Crispin Hunt, President of the PRS Members’ Council.

With summer and the festival season now drawn to a close, we have once again seen that the appetite for live music is greater than ever.

The LIVE Annual Report, using our setlist data, shows there was one gig every 137 seconds across the UK in 2024.

In the same year, PRS for Music paid out 20% more in live royalties, the strongest growth we’ve seen in years, led mostly by large stadium and arena tours. A massive £68.5m was paid to more than 39,000 songwriters whose works were performed live.

We’re hugely proud of this. We want to ensure that every creator is being paid their royalties as quickly and as accurately as possible, reinforcing our long-term commitment to greater transparency.

But we know there is also an opportunity to do more. There are still unclaimed royalties that we need to get to the songwriters who have earned them. Some are still waiting on royalties not because the performances didn’t happen, or because the music wasn’t loved by an audience, but because the most basic step in the process was never completed: too many setlists are simply not being submitted.

I’ve spent enough time in this business to know that paperwork is never seen as the glamorous part of music. The magic happens on stage, in the studio, and in the moments where a song connects with someone for the first time. But the reality is this: every setlist is a financial record. It is the mechanism that turns a live performance into a royalty payment.

We have a duty to provide the education and the tools to make setlist reporting easy, that’s why we’ve created AI tools that automatically turn photos of handwritten setlists – which are a common submission – into readable text.

That’s why we communicate to members time and time again, reminding them of distribution dates and encouraging them to submit their information.

However, here’s the point I want to say plainly and publicly: the responsibility for sourcing this missing element cannot sit with PRS or its members alone.

“I’ve spent enough time in this business to know that paperwork is not the glamorous part.”

There needs to be a culture shift. While the obligation to report setlists ultimately lies with venues and festivals, promoters, managers, agents and the artists themselves all have their part to play in ensuring the accuracy of these setlists.

The same professionalism that ensures the lights go up on time, the sound is checked, the box office is reconciled, and the crew are paid should extend to making sure the setlist is submitted. If the soundcheck is non-negotiable, submitting the setlist should be too.

There’s a persistent myth in some corners of the industry that PRS withholds money – that if a setlist goes missing, the royalties just sit somewhere unclaimed. Let’s be clear: all Tariff LP (Live Performance) royalties are paid out. PRS does not withhold money from songwriters and performers.

Here’s how it works: PRS collects licence fees from venues and promoters under the Tariff LP for the performance of music at concerts and festivals. We pay out that money to PRS members and rights-holders four times a year, based on the performance data we have.

If a setlist has been submitted for a show, we know exactly what was played and can allocate royalties directly to the right songwriters and their publishers. If you ask some artists, they’ll know that sometimes it’s even members of the PRS team, running around venues and festivals collecting setlists themselves.

If no setlist is submitted, we can’t include that performance in the allocation – we don’t know who to pay because we don’t know what music was played. Any unallocated revenue is paid out every year, proportionately, to the creators whose works were reported from other live performances that year.

If your performance data (setlist) isn’t submitted, you won’t see your royalty share this time around. The good news is that under Tariff LP, you have three years to submit a setlist for a past performance (seven years for classical music). So, if you realise you’ve missed out, there’s still time to put it right and get paid.

At PRS, we’ve invested heavily in making the process as seamless as possible. You can file a setlist from your phone backstage or from your laptop over breakfast the next morning. We’ve embedded the tools into member portals, improved the user experience, and made the reporting process quicker.

Our next few months will be dedicated to launching more educational initiatives, partnering with promoters to prompt submissions at the right moment and taking the message to venues, conferences and rehearsal rooms. But technology and education will only get us so far if we don’t also change the culture.

That cultural change starts with recognising that setlist reporting isn’t an optional extra – it’s a fundamental part of the live music economy. If you care about creators being paid, it should be as much a part of your routine as loading in your gear.

And for the industry, it should be built into every contract, every promoter agreement, every standard operating procedure. Our live tariffs even offer incentives for those who provide setlists. The truth is, we can’t pay what we can’t see.

I’ve seen first-hand the difference it makes when the system works. There’s the emerging songwriter who played a handful of support slots at small theatres and received a live performance royalty payment that helped invest in their next work or went towards the costs to hire a studio.

“What we need is the will to embed setlist reporting into the DNA of live music.”

There’s the veteran writer who co-wrote a track a decade ago and still receives payments because younger artists are covering the song on tour. Every single one of those performances was captured in a setlist. These aren’t abstract transactions; they’re moments where the system proves its worth, where the rights of creators are respected in a tangible way.

I’ve also seen the flipside: the performance that’s never recorded, the missing setlist that means the money hasn’t flowed through yet. This is where the mistrust starts to creep in. When people don’t understand why they haven’t been paid, myths fill the gaps and confidence in the system is undermined. We must tackle that head-on, with facts, transparency, and a collective, industry-wide commitment to
do better.  

It’s time to reframe the conversation. Live royalties are not a mysterious process that happens behind closed doors, delivered by bots. They’re the result of a chain of actions, from the writing, then performance of a work, the licensing of the venue and prompt payment of the invoice, to the setlist submission and the payment of royalties to the songwriters. Every link in that chain matters. 

The solution lies in shared responsibility. Promoters should make setlist submission a standard part of their settlement process. Venues should provide a clear and easy way for performers to submit before they leave the building. And artists, whether playing The O2 arena or the back room of a pub, must see providing  the venue with a setlist as part of their professional practice.  

The live music sector is one of the most collaborative parts of our industry – it works because everyone pulls in the same direction to make the show happen.

Paying songwriters for that performance should be no different, and our collective priority should be making sure the people who create the music that fills our venues are recognised and rewarded.  

What we need is the will to embed setlist reporting into the DNA of live music. Live music is a collective triumph and paying the people whose songs the audience come to sing along to should be celebrated too.

The gap between the two is smaller than you might think — sometimes, it’s as small as a single unfiled setlist. Let’s build a live music economy that works for everyone.

This article originally appeared in the latest (Q3 2025) issue of MBW’s premium quarterly publication, Music Business UK, which is out now.

MBUK is available as part of a MBW+ subscription – details through here.

All physical subscribers will receive a complimentary digital edition with each issue.Music Business Worldwide

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