I’d be interested in my readers’ explanations for this. I doubt that it can be explained by their paying too much attention to the media.
For my own part I’m satisfied but I’m upper income, married, religious, a college graduate, a Democrat, and over 55 which fits the pattern.
It has been observed that the graph above aligns pretty well with spending on food as a percentage of disposable income.
“food”
THAT result makes perfect sense.
I really have trouble….. satisfaction with my personal life?
Wish I could go back, be young, be with my wife, other than that, ….
there’s the arthritis, sleepless nights, fatigue, feet do hurt… so …. lets go out to dinner!!
What an open poll question!
What I see is that most Americans are satisfied with their personal life. Over the last 40+ years, it’s consistently been in a 10-point range – high 70s during recessions and high 80s during booms.
It looks like everyone recovered from a lengthy downward trend that started around 2007 but had a brief upswing of satisfaction under the Trump Administration only to again become increasingly unsatisfied following the 2020 election.
Doesn’t correlate that well with food. Certainly not for the drop starting about 2006 nor the increase starting about 2014. What’s noticeable is how positive it generally is and the variance is pretty small, even during a recession.
https://www.ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/2020/november/average-share-of-income-spent-on-food-in-the-united-states-remained-relatively-steady-from-2000-to-2019/
Steve
I tend to look at trends rather than levels. It’s trending in the wrong direction.
I agree with the trend comment. Further, people tend not to answer a poll question with “yeah, I’m a loser and unsatisfied with my loser life.”
Lastly, remember we live in stratified layers of people, not averages. One example: if you are under 30 today and getting slaughtered by rents you aren’t too satisfied. If you are 55 and own a home you refi’d at 3%………..things look better.
” It’s trending in the wrong direction”
We’ll have to see what happens in the future, but I think it’s not surprising, considering how unpopular inflation is. I’m honestly surprised it hasn’t gone lower.