Together with Public

Welcome to our first post of 2026! Thanks again to the hundreds of thousands of you that made 2025 so special.

The Rich Habits ecosystem has never seen such incredible growth — and you’re the ones to thank. A special shoutout to the ~80,000 of you that had the Rich Habits Podcast as your #1 show on Spotify last year! That’s more than the total amount of people that will be attending the Fiesta Bowl (Ole Miss vs. Miami) tonight!

Make sure you’re following us on Spotify, Apple, YouTube, or wherever else you watch the show! We want you to get notified when each new episode is released.

A quick breakdown — in case you don’t have the time.

Wall Street is expecting Tech profits to grow by +26% in 2026.

Analysts on Wall Street are expecting the S&P 500 to grow profits (in aggregate) by +13.7% in 2026, compared to an estimated +12.1% in 2025. However, one sector of the index is expected to grow profits nearly twice as fast as the others — technology. According to Citi, Wall Street’s 2026 consensus expectation for profit growth in the technology sector is +24.2%, with the bank’s own forecast sitting at +26.4%.

In our view, this earnings growth is very much welcomed. The S&P 500 entered 2025 with a forward P/E ratio of roughly 22x — well above historical norms. Despite this, the index delivered a total return of +17.8% last year. Only about 3% of that return came from multiple expansion, with the remainder driven by earnings growth. As we enter 2026 with the S&P 500’s forward P/E ratio in the 94th percentile historically, continued earnings growth will be required to push markets higher.

Today’s Rich Habits Newsletter is brought to you by Public, the investing platform that combines a broad range of asset classes with the tools you need to build and manage your wealth. 

From stocks to bonds, options, crypto, and more—it’s all here. You can even generate fixed income with a suite of yield accounts. If you’re looking for more than just a place to trade, discover the investing platform that’s as serious about your money as you are. 

👉 Episode 151: Our 2026 “Money Calendar”

In this week’s Monday-morning episode of the Rich Habits Podcast (linked here) — Austin and Robert laid out a simple, month-by-month money calendar for 2026, designed to help you stay consistent all year without getting overwhelmed.

Here’s what they covered…

The big takeaway: you don’t need to fix everything at once — just focus on the right money move each month.

👉 Q&A: Passive Investing “Bubble,” Overlapping ETFs, & Diversifying $200K

Here’s a link to the Q&A episode that was posted this morning.

You can submit questions for these episodes by asking them inside of the Rich Habits Network, replying to this email, or sending us a DM on Instagram.

The Rich Habits Podcast is available on Spotify, Apple, iHeart, YouTube, and wherever else you get your content!

America’s blue-collar job engine is quietly stalling.

Employment across trades and industry is now down roughly 123K from its early-2025 peak, marking the first sustained decline in blue-collar jobs since the pandemic and the depths of the Great Recession. Over the past year alone, the U.S. has lost about 65K industrial jobs — a sharp reversal from 2024, when the economy added roughly 250K.

Manufacturing and transportation are driving most of the losses. Manufacturing employment has now been falling for more than two years straight, with the sector’s share of the workforce dropping below 8% — a record low. Transportation equipment and electronics lead the declines, but the weakness has become broad-based across nearly every major industry.

Construction is now rolling over as well. Job growth in the sector has slowed dramatically, adding just 52K jobs over the last twelve months versus 191K the year prior. Residential contractors — plumbers, electricians, roofers, and specialty trades — have lost nearly 55K jobs over the past year as the post-COVID building boom fades.

Rent prices continue to roll over — and supply is doing the heavy lifting.

The national median rent fell another 0.8% in December to $1,356, closing out 2025 with five straight months of declines. Rents are now down 1.3% year-over-year and nearly 6% below their 2022 peak, with modest additional softness likely into early spring.

Vacancies tell the story. The national multifamily vacancy rate has climbed to 7.3%, the highest level on record, as a wave of new supply continues to hit the market while demand remains sluggish. Units now take an average of 39 days to lease – another post-2019 high.

This is a tale of two markets. Austin remains the softest large metro, with rents down 6.6% over the past year, while supply-constrained areas like Providence are still seeing growth north of 5%.

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Disclaimer: This is not financial advice or a recommendation for any investment. The content is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

Public Disclosures: All investing involves the risk of loss, including loss of principal. Brokerage services for US-listed, registered securities, options and bonds in a self-directed account are offered by Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA & SIPC. Cryptocurrency trading services are offered by Bakkt Crypto Solutions (NMLS ID 1890144), which is licensed to engage in virtual currency business activity by the NYSDFS. Cryptocurrency is highly speculative and involves a high degree of risk. Cryptocurrency holdings are not protected by the FDIC or SIPC.
As part of the IRA Match Program, Public Investing will fund a 1% match of: (a) all eligible IRA transfers and 401(k) rollovers made to a Public IRA; and (b) all eligible contributions made to a Public IRA up to the account’s annual contribution limit. The matched funds must be kept in the account for at least 5 years to avoid an early removal fee. Match rate and other terms of the Match Program are subject to change at any time. See full terms here.

See terms and conditions of Public’s ACATS & IRA Match Program. Matched funds must remain in the account for at least 5 years to avoid an early removal fee. Match rate and other terms of the Match Program are subject to change at any time.

Disclosure: The author of this post has an existing business relationship with NEOS Investment Management, LLC, and is also a holder of numerous NEOS ETFs. The thoughts and opinions in this written piece are solely those of the author.