WASHINGTON, D.C. — Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index is -29 in April, nine points lower than March’s -20 reading. This is the first time in five months that confidence has not seen a marginal improvement, and the first decline in economic confidence in the past seven months.
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Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index summarizes Americans’ evaluations of current economic conditions (as excellent, good, only fair or poor) and their outlook for the economy (whether they believe it is getting better or worse).
The index has a theoretical range of +100 (if all Americans rate current conditions as excellent or good and say the economy is getting better) to -100 (if all Americans rate the economy as poor and say it is getting worse). In Gallup’s trend of these measures since 1992, the highest ECI score was +56 in January 2000, and the lowest was -72 in October 2008.
The latest results are from an April 1-22, 2024, Gallup poll, conducted as gas prices, and inflation more generally, were rising. Also, during this period, the stock market gave back some of its recent record gains, and high interest rates remained a financial stumbling block for consumers.
Shortly after the poll was completed, the federal government announced that U.S. economic…
