The Meme Economy Timing Signal

In Kyla Scanlon's recent piece, "How AI, Healthcare, and Labubu Became the American Economy" she made a striking observation about how economic exclusion drives speculative behavior. We took a look at her insight through the Perscient database and found something remarkable - our data reveals a consistent pattern where "young Americans shut out" narratives reliably predict "degenerate economy" stories by several months.

What follows is how Kyla's pulse-reading on meme coins and mystery boxes reveals a predictive framework that mainstream narratives consistently miss.

1. The Meme Economy Timing Signal

Memecoins and mystery boxes are a way for people to feel they are participating in the boom, even as they are priced out of its tangible rewards. When you feel shut out of institutions, you buy meme coins that turn financial nihilism into a form of cultural expression.

The timing of this observation is nuanced, and our Perscient data reveals a fascinating pattern I at least hadn’t really seen or thought of before. Any time we get a big "young Americans shut out" trend, it's consistently followed by "degenerate economy" narratives. Con-sis-tent-ly. Gears on a clock (or a bike) style. The chart shows a massive degen economy spike in 2021, followed by young Americans exclusion stories in 2024. And if you look close, you’ll see that both narratives are currently depressed, but well off the bottom lately(!).

What Kyla is sensing - tracking a pulse separately from broader mainstream and social media lenses, ahem - could signal the beginning of the next cycle. The media ping-pongs between "the Youth is being screwed over" and "the Youth are a bunch of degens," but our data shows this isn't random. There's a predictable sequence here: exclusion stories build first, then speculative behavior gets labeled as degeneracy months later.

These charts are starting to bounce back, so watch for the pattern to play out again. Exclusion stories will lead degen economy stories, because this is a media engagement playbook at this point.

2. The Healthcare Job Dependency Cycle

With 75% of new jobs in healthcare and social assistance, our workforce is being absorbed by the essential but underfunded 'maintenance economy' of an aging population.

This connects to the broader exclusion theme. Our Perscient data shows healthcare job dependency narratives peaked during COVID (2020) and again during the GLP-1 surge (2024), but rather than fading, they're morphing higher again. It may not predict another spike, but there are structural forces within the labor statistics that are keeping these conditions in play. This keeps a rising story ripe for a spike, making for a sectoral employment trend and story worth tracking.

When traditional wealth-building paths get absorbed into maintenance work, it amplifies the exclusion pressures that drive people toward speculative alternatives. Kyla is identifying how demographic inevitability creates the conditions for repeated meme economy cycles. Seeing how it correlates with - if not stems from - labor and employment trends is fascinating. This becomes especially relevant in a sideways market or downturn, because consumption drives the economy, these are the jobs to really watch now.

3. The Broken Gears Reality Check

The US economy is sort of like that bike. It's moving, but its gearing system is completely out of whack. The US is operating with 3 broken gears that no longer connect.

Our Perscient data reveals that concerns about America's economy becoming concentrated peaked in mid-2024, but rather than disappearing, they're also morphing into something more nuanced. The narrative is evolving from recessionary crisis fears toward stagflationary reality acceptance - which is exactly the kind of "broken but still moving" dynamic that creates space for meme economy participation.

What we're witnessing isn't the end of fragmentation concerns, but their evolution toward understanding that "broken" doesn't necessarily mean recession. It means ongoing inefficiencies that price people out of traditional participation while keeping the system moving - the perfect conditions for the exclusion-to-speculation cycle Kyla identifies. And as for concentration concerns, they are turning up again - but off the lows is a long way from a peak reading still.

It’s probably obvious by this point - but what makes this analysis so valuable is that Kyla spotted a predictive pattern that our data confirms works fairly consistently. Yes, the magnitude adjusts, but this-follows-that cycling (bike bonus points, maybe?) is a notation worth making. The meme economy isn't random youth behavior - it's a measurable response to measurable exclusion that follows a reliable timeline. Understanding when the next cycle starts gives you months of advance notice on significant cultural and financial trends.

Read Kyla's full piece at her Substack for the complete Three Americas framework.

Charts powered by Perscient - tracking narratives in real-time so you can see reality before the story catches up.

https://kyla.substack.com/p/how-ai-healthcare-and-labubu-became