What was 2025 really like for working Americans? Not the official narrative from Washington—the truth from families struggling with bills, small business owners absorbing costs, and blue-collar workers grinding through another year where effort didn't match reward.
In this no-holds-barred 46-minute episode of UNLEASHED 101, host Jeremy Hanson delivers the year-in-review that working families actually lived—not the one politicians want you to believe.
WHAT THIS EPISODE COVERS:
THE REALITY OF 2025 FOR WORKING FAMILIES
How bad were costs in 2025? If you're blue-collar, run a small business, or work hourly, you don't need statistics—you lived it. Groceries that cost $200/week in 2020 hit $350 by late 2025. Insurance premiums doubled while coverage decreased. Fuel prices bounced unpredictably. Housing stayed completely out of reach for young families.
What happened to small businesses in 2025? They got crushed from both sides. Higher supply costs, increased labor expenses, skyrocketing insurance, expanding compliance requirements—all with zero sympathy from regulators who've never signed a payroll check.
Why is there a disconnect between media and reality? Working Americans kept hearing "the economy is improving" while drowning financially. This gap between official messaging and lived experience doesn't create anger—it creates something worse: fundamental distrust in institutions, media, and government itself.
QUESTIONS THIS EPISODE ANSWERS:
- What economic struggles did working Americans face in 2025?
- Why do blue-collar workers still trust Trump?
- What were the biggest challenges for small businesses in 2025?
- How did working families adapt to rising costs?
- Why don't official economic statistics match what people are experiencing?
- What policy changes must happen in 2026?
- Why are skilled trades in such high demand?
- How can small businesses survive crushing regulations?
- What's the real cost of living increase for working families?
- Why do working-class Americans feel forgotten by government?
🇺🇸 WHY WORKING AMERICANS STILL TRUST TRUMP:
This episode tackles what mainstream media refuses to understand: Why does the working class support Trump?
Not because of tweets or personality—because of policy memory. Working Americans remember:
- Lower energy costs that didn't force impossible choices
- Stronger labor demand where employers competed for workers
Fewer foreign entanglements and more focus on domestic problems
- A government that acknowledged their existence instead of dismissing them
The establishment calls this "populism" like it's a disease. Working Americans call it remembering when their lives were better.
⚙️ THE QUIET WINS OF 2025:
Despite overwhelming pressure, working Americans didn't fold:
Trades stayed in demand: Electricians, plumbers, HVAC technicians, welders—all experienced labor shortages that gave workers actual leverage for the first time in years.
Skilled labor proved irreplaceable: AI can't fix your HVAC. Remote workers can't repair your truck. Google can't wire your building. Physical skills performed locally remain essential and irreplaceable.
Families adapted: Cut waste, eliminated subscriptions, operated leaner. Not ideal, but it proved American resilience and resourcefulness.
Side hustles became survival tools: Multiple income streams shifted from aspirational to necessary—representing systemic failure but individual adaptability.
WHAT MUST HAPPEN IN 2026:
Jeremy delivers specific, actionable policy recommendations:
1. ENERGY POLICY MUST FAVOR AMERICANS FIRST
- Expand domestic oil and natural gas production
- Invest seriously in nuclear energy
- Stop subsidizing unreliable energy that raises consumer costs
- Make energy independence the priority over global commitments
2. SMALL BUSINESS MUST BE PROTECTED—NOT MANAGED
- Simplify regulations for operators without compliance departments
- Create predictable tax policy without mid-year changes
- Eliminate compliance theater that accomplishes nothing
3. TRADES AND SKILLED LABOR MUST BE RESPECTED AGAIN
- Reinvest in vocational education eliminated over 30 years
- Create pathways from high school to apprenticeships to careers
- Stop treating trade work as a backup option when it pays better than most degrees
4. GOVERNMENT MUST STOP PRETENDING AND START LISTENING
- Tell the truth about policy costs and tradeoffs
- Acknowledge who benefits and who pays for every decision
- Rebuild institutional credibility through sustained honesty
5. CULTURE MUST STOP ATTACKING WORK ITSELF
- Restore dignity to hard work instead of treating it as oppression
- Recognize that providing for family is noble, not outdated
- Stop pathologizing effort, ambition, and success
KEY INSIGHTS:
✔ "Inflation cooling" doesn't help when prices never come back down - A 30% increase that slows is still permanent damage to family budgets
✔ Working Americans don't get to pause - Can't delay car repairs until the economy improves or postpone medical bills until next quarter
✔ The limiting factor isn't opportunity anymore—it's survival bandwidth - Families making impossible calculations between gas and groceries, dentist and car repair
✔ Small business owners absorbed costs personally - Cut their own pay, deferred their own healthcare, skipped salary to make employee payroll
✔ The disconnect between data and experience breeds distrust - When your life contradicts official messaging, you stop trusting institutions entirely
✔ Nothing runs without skilled trades - Stock markets, tech companies, and financial services all depend on electricians, plumbers, truckers, and builders
WHO THIS EPISODE IS FOR:
✅ Blue-collar workers in trades, construction, manufacturing, and skilled labor
✅ Small business owners struggling with costs, regulations, and compliance
✅ Working families feeling the gap between official narratives and daily reality
✅ Hourly workers and commission-based employees living paycheck to paycheck
✅ Entrepreneurs running service businesses (cleaning, pressure washing, contracting)
✅ Anyone tired of being talked down to by people insulated from economic pressure
✅ Voters trying to understand why working-class Americans still lean Trump
✅ Parents worried about their kids' future in an economy that keeps getting harder
⏱️ EPISODE TIMESTAMPS:
- [0:00] Cold Open - What working Americans endured in 2025
- [2:30] What 2025 Actually Felt Like - Survival math vs. political narratives
- [10:30] The Biggest Struggles - Cost of living, small business pressure, media disconnect
- [20:30] Why Working Americans Still Trust Trump - Policy memory, not personality
- [28:30] The Quiet Wins - Trades, adaptation, resilience despite systemic pressure
- [34:30] What Has to Happen in 2026 - Five specific policy solutions
- [45:30] Final Message - Working Americans aren't broken, just tired
THE UNLEASHED 101 DIFFERENCE:
This isn't another podcast talking about working Americans. This is a podcast talking to working Americans—and actually listening.
No condescension. No spin. No pretending your struggles don't exist.
Just honest analysis from someone who runs multiple service businesses, signs paychecks, deals with regulations, absorbs cost increases, and lives the same economic reality you do.
UNLEASHED 101 is where working-class perspectives get heard even when they contradict approved narratives. Where your experience matters more than official statistics. Where blue-collar wisdom outranks coastal elite theory.
🎙️ ABOUT THE HOST:
Jeremy Hanson is an entrepreneur running multiple service businesses (cleaning companies, pressure washing, food trucks) for over 20 years. He's hired hundreds of people, managed multi-operation businesses, survived great years and terrible years—and learned that working Americans are the foundation everything else stands on.
His mission with UNLEASHED 101: give working families the honest political and economic analysis they deserve—without the condescension, without the spin, without pretending elite priorities matter more than yours.
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🔍 RELATED TOPICS:
Working class economics | Blue collar politics | Small business struggles 2025 | Why working Americans support Trump | Cost of living crisis | Skilled trades shortage | Energy policy and working families | Small business regulations | Vocational education crisis | Trade work dignity | Government disconnect from reality | Inflation impact on families | Working class populism | Economic pressure on hourly workers | Service business challenges
#UNLEASHED101 #WorkingClassAmerica #BlueCollarPolitics #SmallBusinessStruggles #TruthForWorkers
This episode provides unfiltered economic and political analysis for working Americans, small business owners, and blue-collar families tired of being ignored, dismissed, or lied to by people who've never experienced economic pressure.
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