Here's a question for you, about us:

Are we chronic pessimists? Just when will it be a good time to buy a large household item?

The ANZ Consumer Confidence figures came out Friday, and we have sunk again. Unlike business, which went up eight points while punters went down another two points.

What about household items, like a fridge? We haven't felt good about that for any month in four long years.

48 months. Month after month we think it's not a good time to be sticking a bit of Samsung or Sub-Zero or Miele in your house.

Yet how can business feel half-decent given the people they deal with are miserable? And how is it, as the bank pointed out, that the stats don't actually align with our mood?

Spending is up – no, not by a lot, because this isn't a gold rush.

But spending is up and the job ads are up. There are more jobs being advertised. My bet is when the unemployment stats arrive this week at 5.2% or 5.3% that will be it. It will get no worse. The layoffs are over.

There are genuine, tangible, indisputable signs in the economy that things have turned. Call them whatever you want, flickers or green shoots or better days, but they are there.

Like all economies, the tide doesn’t rise and bring everyone with it. But it has to bring some, and some must be feeling better, or good, or (God forbid) upbeat.

Is there a determination among some that we will simply not be happy? We refuse to accept the light at the end of that tunnel. Where once a trip to the seaside and an ice cream on a sunny day lifted the spirit, now we want the whole circus and a merch bag as well before we dare utter anything remotely upbeat.

I have no doubt the tide has turned. I see too many data points, stats, and results to feel any other way.

But New Zealand has caught a disease. You see it in Britain (they have it bad) and also Australia (but a bit less). There's a refusal to accept good news the way we used to.

Where once the possibility was enough to lift a spirit, now you need a tsunami to bowl you over.

The early bird, as always, will catch the worm on this. By the time we hit February or March of 2026 and a lot of people join the bandwagon, the early adopters will have been having a good time for months.

It's only negative if it's actually factually negative.

Being determined to be that way is a state of mind, not a reality.

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