Americans are pessimistic about the economy. According to a poll released Tuesday, only 21% of adults said their finances were better th...
Americans are pessimistic about the economy. According to a poll released Tuesday, only 21% of adults said their finances were better than a year ago, compared to 26% when the question was asked a year earlier, although by most metrics l The economy has improved considerably during this period. period. The survey of 5,365 adults was conducted last month for The New York Times by Momentary, the online research company formerly known as SurveyMonkey.
Overall consumer confidence is at its lowest in nearly five years since Momentive conducted its survey. Republicans have been particularly pessimistic about the economy since President Biden took office a year ago, but in recent months Democrats have also become more austere. Other surveys have found similar results.
Inflation seems to be one of the main reasons for people’s gloomy outlook. Nearly nine in 10 Americans say they are at least “somewhat concerned” about inflation, and six in 10 are “very concerned,” according to the survey. Concerns about inflation cross generational, racial and even partisan lines: 95% of Republicans, 88% of Independents and 82% of Democrats say they are worried.
“Almost the only group of people who say they are better now than they were a year ago are people who got a raise that meets or exceeds inflation,” said Laura Wronski , researcher at Momentive.
They are not many. Only 17 percent of workers say they have received increases that have followed inflation in the past year. Most of the rest say they either received late increases in price increases or received no increases at all; 8 percent of those surveyed said they had suffered a pay cut.
Government data also shows that, overall, prices have risen faster than wages in recent months: the consumer price index rose 6.8% in November, a nearly four decades tall; Average hourly earnings rose 4.8% in November, and other measures also show that wage gains are lagging behind price increases.
Yet some workers are experiencing much faster wage growth. Hourly earnings of leisure and hospitality workers rose 12.3% in November, much faster than inflation. Workers in other low-wage service sectors also register large gains.
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