Household financial pressure

Source: Survey of Consumer Expectations, © 2013–2026 Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY). The SCE data are available without charge at the New York Fed and may be used subject to license terms posted there. FRBNY disclaims any responsibility for this analysis and interpretation of Survey of Consumer Expectations data.

A balance of reported improvement and deterioration

The balance subtracts the share reporting worse household finances than a year earlier from the share reporting better finances. Zero means equal shares; a negative number means deterioration is more widespread. This is a survey response balance, not a percentage change in income or a count of defaults.

The national series uses the New York Fed’s published response shares. The income-group cut is not in that chart file, so MacroRoom calculates it from public SCE microdata, using valid Q1 responses and the survey weights. Respondents with missing income bands are excluded only from the income cuts. The reconstructed national balance is checked against the independently published national series.

The default is the average of three consecutive monthly balances. Missing months leave a gap. The distribution bars show the selected raw month, defaulting to the latest observation. The public microdata have a longer release lag, so income-group histories end earlier than the national history.

Group-months with fewer than 50 valid respondents or an effective sample size below 30 are suppressed. Effective sample size is the square of the sum of weights divided by the sum of squared weights. These counts do not supply a confidence interval for the smoothed trend: repeated participation and survey design matter.

Payment expectations

The optional debt-payment panel is the New York Fed’s published mean respondent probability of missing a minimum payment during the next three months. It is an expectation, not observed delinquency. Dollar income bands are nominal and can change composition as incomes rise.

Credit access and unpaid bills

Perceived credit access uses the published national SCE shares reporting easier or harder access than a year earlier, with the same three-month smoothing. It has no income breakdown. The SHED bill-payment panel is the latest published annual share of adults who did not pay every bill in full in the prior month. The question changed in 2023, so the panel does not splice incompatible definitions into a history.

Dates, changes and limits

Every group retains its actual latest observation period. Comparisons use calendar dates; missing reference dates remain unavailable. Dollar and index changes are percentages, while rates and survey balances change in percentage points. Percent changes from a nonpositive base are unavailable. Annual observations stay annual.

The indexed view sets all selected groups to 100 at their first common positive observation within the visible window. Changing the group selection or history can change that baseline. The table always shows the underlying levels. A rising index describes improvement relative to that baseline, not an absolute standard of financial health.

Source releases can revise earlier observations. Retrieval dates, source hashes and cached-source flags are retained in the data manifest. A failed request retains the last available source with a visible note; a refreshed page does not imply that every underlying source was newly published.

Each chart names its measure’s source. Group definitions and dates can differ across the supporting panels.

Download MacroRoom’s constructed measure (CSV)

Institutional supporting series are available from the original publishers above. The CSV preserves the period, population, units, estimation status and source links.

Source and refresh manifest