The Stock Market Isn’t the Economy – Or Is It?

Long before there were memes and social media wasn’t even a pixelated gleam in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye, Wall Street had its own economic love language.

Gems like “Sell in May and go away,” advising investors to take the summer off. Or “Never buy anything from someone who is out of breath” for obvious reasons. And then there’s the favorite nugget of the financial intelligentsia, “The stock market isn’t the economy.”

While that last one is true, you wouldn’t know if from a quick perusal of any – or every – business news site.

Business media bends over backward to stay relevant while feeding the insatiable beast that is digital media. So naturally Wall Street is a central focus because something is happening there every day. And with the thousands of companies large and small traded on the various exchanges, there is always news.

That’s why daily business news site homepages are dominated by market news, from current activity to earnings reports to mergers or bankruptcies. The page likely has an interactive stock ticker somewhere in view, tracking the market in realish time. And while there may be an inflation report story or a piece on the latest unemployment statistics, most of the news is about the equities markets.

From there, those stories at the top get pushed into the information maelstrom of social media, adding to the sea of content the rest of the world has to navigate as if jumping from rock to rock across a rushing stream.

With the amplification of social media, the leading stories of the day, heavy with Wall Street-focused content, become the business news theme of the day. Once the stories gain a little traction, the commentary and analysis kicks in. That in turn generates new engagement on the theme of the day, maintaining interest until the next update and so on and so on. And that becomes the digitized, homogenized and monetized package of the day’s business news.

So when Joe carries his bag of donuts home from work or Brittany gets out of class and has time before her shift starts, if they want to check out what’s happening in business and finance they’ll get a heavy does of Wall Street. Even those going old school and tuning in the evening news on their widescreens will hear about the closing numbers on Wall Street, and may even get a colorful graphic.

Anyone with even the slightest interest in news about business and finance is going to see a lot of “news” about Wall Street. There is a lot of other news out there and a lot of good journalists writing stories about it. Those who want to stay on top of things have to work for it a little, or in the words of social media, do their own research.

But you’ll still have to wade through a lot of market stories. In a global economy with international exchanges and after-hours trading the equities markets, like rust, never sleep.