Consumer Confidence Falls to Its Lowest Level in More Than a Decade

American consumers grew sharply more pessimistic in September, with worries about prices, gasoline and jobs pushing a closely watched gauge of confidence to its lowest point in more than 12 years.

The Conference Board said Tuesday that its Consumer Confidence Index fell 6.7 points to 81.9, down from 88.6 in August. Economists polled by Reuters had expected a reading of about 89.2, so the drop was far deeper than forecast. Reuters described the level as the lowest since 2014.

Both halves of the survey weakened. The Present Situation Index, which reflects how people judge business and job conditions today, fell 7.9 points to 109.3. The Expectations Index, which tracks the outlook for income, business and jobs over the next six months, slid 5.9 points to 63.6, its third straight monthly decline. Readings below 80 on that measure have historically been read as a warning sign of recession, and PNC Economics noted that the September figure was the lowest since April 2025.

Dana Peterson, the group’s chief economist, said consumers’ view of current business conditions had turned negative for the first time since September 2024. Assessments of the job market also worsened, though they stayed slightly positive: the gap between people saying jobs are plentiful and those saying they are hard to get narrowed to under two percentage points.

Prices dominated the written comments. Peterson said references to the cost of goods and services, and to oil and gas prices in particular, reached new highs, reflecting a surge in fuel costs during the month. Mentions of war and conflict eased but remained high. Average 12-month inflation expectations rose to 6.1 percent, and the share of people expecting higher interest rates over the next year jumped to about 68 percent.

The pressure is showing up at the kitchen table. For only the second time since the question was added about four years ago, more consumers described their family’s current finances as bad than good. Confidence fell among Democrats, Republicans and independents alike.

The Conference Board report followed a similar reading from the University of Michigan last week. Its consumer sentiment index fell to 48.1 in September from 51.7 in August, the second-lowest reading on record, and PNC Economics said a big jump in gasoline prices over the month drove the index lower.

There are reasons for caution in reading too much into one month of survey data. Consumers in the Conference Board poll still expected their household incomes to rise over the next six months, if by less than before, and most still expected stock prices to climb over the next year.

Still, the direction is hard to miss. Expectations for business conditions, jobs and income all deteriorated in September, and analysts at PNC said confidence was unlikely to recover in a meaningful way until conflict in the Middle East eased and gasoline prices came down.