US human (in)security so far in FY2024, a breakdown

Speaking Security Newsletter | Note n°224 | 14 November 2023

Situation

According to a Financial Times survey, just 14 percent of Americans think they’re better off financially since Biden took office. Among Democrats, only 24 percent think so.

Data

The data on US financial insecurity backs the FT poll up, based on updated figures from the Census Bureau. On average, three in ten Americans faced financial hardship in 2020. Now four in ten do. The financial security situation significantly improved in 2021 when Biden expanded the welfare superstructure built in response to the pandemic; the situation deteriorated as he dismantled it. I’ve written about all this before.

Granted, it’s early in fiscal year 2024. But there isn’t much reason to expect FY2024 to be better than FY2023, especially considering the onset of student loan repayments and the expiration of child care provider grants.

Financial security is just one of many measures of a president’s domestic policy. But when it comes to evaluating human security conditions, it’s typically the first indicator mentioned.¹ Most people haven’t got a choice but to be acutely aware of it.

A high rate of financial hardship² is a serious challenge for any presidential incumbent, but it’s especially a problem for Biden because he’s all but committed to not fixing it.

^Alt text for screen readers: More than 40 percent of Americans are facing financial hardship. This teal column chart shows the percent of Americans having difficulty paying household expenses from fiscal years 2020 to 2024. In 2020, 32 percent; 2021, 31 percent; 2022, 35 percent; 2023, 39 percent; 2024, 41 percent. Figures are fiscal year averages. Data comes from the U.S. Census Bureau. More at stephensemler.substack.com.

-Stephen (@stephensemler; stephen@securityreform.org)

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1. That or food security, which is also worse now than it was in FY2020.

2. Financial hardship is defined here as the percentage of US adults who reported difficulty paying routine household expenses in the last 7 days, per the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey.