Consumer confidence plunges to 12-year low
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Americans' confidence in the economy plunged to start the year at the lowest in 12 years — amid consumer angst about prices and pessimism about the job market.
Driving the news: The Conference Board's long-running consumer confidence index fell 9.7 points in January, to 84.5, from a revised 94.2 in December.
- The steep drop was seen across both survey respondents' assessment of the present situation and their expectations for the future.
- The index is now below even its level at the depths of the global pandemic, when unemployment peaked at nearly 15% (it was only 4.4% in December).
By the numbers: The share of consumers who said that jobs are plentiful plunged to 23.9% from 27.5% in December. Similarly, 13.9% expected more jobs to be available in six months, compared with 17.4% in December.
- Those data points are just the latest evidence that Americans perceive a much weaker labor market than headline numbers imply — and may reflect wariness of looming AI-driven job losses.
What they're saying: Survey respondents' answers "continued to skew towards pessimism," Dana Peterson, chief economist at the Conference Board, said in the release.
- "References to prices and inflation, oil and gas prices, and food and grocery prices remained elevated," she added. "Mentions of tariffs and trade, politics, and the labor market also rose in January, and references to health/insurance and war edged higher."
The bottom line: American consumers are on edge and deeply pessimistic about the outlook, despite robust GDP growth and a relatively low overall unemployment rate.
