Consumer confidence dives to lowest point in 12 years

Hugh Jackson

(States Newsroom) Monthly consumer confidence in January has sunk to its lowest point since 2014, The Conference Board announced Tuesday.

“Consumers’ write-in responses on factors affecting the economy continued to skew towards pessimism,” said Dana Peterson, the chief economist for The Conference Board, a global nonprofit whose monthly consumer survey of thousands of consumers is widely watched by economists, executives, and policymakers.

“References to prices and inflation, oil and gas prices, and food and grocery prices remained elevated,” Peterson said in a statement accompanying the report’s release. “Mentions of tariffs and trade, politics, and the labor market also rose in January, and references to health/insurance and war edged higher.”

Measurements of consumers’ present outlook as well as anticipated conditions drove the overall index to the lowest point since May, 2014, “surpassing its COVID-19 pandemic depths.”

The survey found confidence slipped among all age groups and income brackets.

Although consumer confidence remained higher among Republicans than Democrats, it sank among all political affiliations, dropping the most precipitously among independent voters.