Consumer Confidence: Start Shoveling

Feb. 9, 2010 — -- Like Washington D.C., consumer confidence is impressively snowed in.

More than nine in 10 Americans say the economy's in bad shape, more than three-quarters call it a bad time to spend money and more than half say their own finances are in the freezer. The ABC News Consumer Comfort Index, based on these, stands at an icy -48 on its scale of +100 to -100.

Click here for a PDF with charts and data table.

The gale's been blowing a long while. While the CCI inched up to -41 at the start of the year, its best in over a year, that's awful by historical standards. And it's worsened since, buried at around its current level for five weeks straight. The index is 6 points from its all-time low just over a year ago, and a world away from its long-term average, -13, in 24 years of weekly polls.

Unemployment, which is closely linked to consumer sentiment, did ease a bit in January. But 9.7 percent is hardly a number to rally around.

INDEX – Views of the economy overall are the worst of the index's three measures; only 8 percent rate it positively, 30 points below the long-term average and in single digits for 11 weeks straight. Just 23 percent call it a good time to spend money, 14 points worse than average. And 47 percent rate their personal finances positively, 10 points below average and less than a majority for 78 of the last 81 weeks.

TREND – The last significant movement for the CCI was in early January, when it fell an unusually large 6 points in one week. Since then it's been frozen in a 2-point range.

The index has been below -40 for a record 94 consecutive weeks, close to the -50 mark, last reached Oct. 25. It's averaged -47 this year, compared with -48 last year, its worst year on record. Its best year was +29 in 2000, its best week, +38 in January that year.

GROUPS – The index as usual is higher among better-off Americans, but has been negative across the board for 50 weeks straight, the longest such run in available data since 1990.

It's -4 among those with the highest incomes but -67 among those with the lowest, -37 among people who've attended college vs. -64 among those who never finished high school, -45 among homeowners but -58 among renters and -41 among men vs. -53 among women.