Donald Trump campaigned for the White House on a promise to make America great — and wealthy — again, but what do Americans see when they check their bank account balances and grocery store receipts, or look over bills at their kitchen table and open mail from bill collectors?
MarketWatch’s new dashboard paints a real-time portrait — in data — of how the average American family is faring financially. See the full graphic here, and add it to your bookmarks — it’ll update automatically every month as new data on income, debt and cost of living are recorded.
Roughly 70% of Americans say they’re either living comfortably or doing okay, according to the latest Federal Reserve report on the nation’s economic well-being. That sentiment improved slightly for the third straight year, but there are troubling trends elsewhere.
A growing share of the nation’s wealth is in the hands of the top 1% of earners. So much so that the average net worth for all American is $534,600 — yet median net worth is only $81,200, according to the Census Bureau’s latest Survey of Consumer Finances.
Americans also aren’t saving as much money as they used to. Nearly half of households say they couldn’t cope with a $400 emergency.
And while we are better able to keep up with our mortgage payments, we’re burdened by more credit card, student loan and auto loan debt than ever. Delinquencies among credit card and auto loan borrowers are ticking steadily upward.
Anxiety around debt and other financial fault lines seems to be shading Americans’ feelings about the future. Only 37% of Americans believe today’s children will grow up to be better off than their parents were financially.
When it comes to cost of living, housing costs are eating up a growing share of people’s paychecks. College tuition continues to soar, and food prices have been mostly on the rise since the Great Recession.
Article source: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/these-10-numbers-reveal-the-average-americans-financial-health-how-do-you-compare-2017-09-15