32% Say Personal Finances Are Getting Better, But 32% Say Worse

Publication Date: 10/10/2025 5:00 AM CST

32% Say Personal Finances Are Getting Better, But 32% Say Worse

Publication: 10/10/2025 5:00 AM CST

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Thirty-two percent (32%) say their finances are getting better, and another 32% say they are getting worse.
- Two weeks ago, 30% said better but 33% said worse.
- A month ago, 31% said better and 34% said worse.
- At the end of July, a low of 28% said their finances were getting better.
While less pessimistic than in recent years, the past couple of months are showing a slightly negative trend.
- As is always the case, the voters whose party controls the White House are more optimistic about their personal finances.
- Forty-seven percent (47%) of Republicans say their finances are getting better compared to 22% of Democrats.
From July 2021 until just before the 2024 election, more people were pessimistic than optimistic about their finances in every single survey.
- In our last survey before the 2024 election, 25% said their finances were getting better and 41% said worse.
- Following the election, pessimism declined. In the first survey taken after Donald Trump took office, 25% said better and 31% worse.
- In May, 2025, for the first time in four years, more voters said their finances were getting better than worse. That followed an announcement from President Trump about a tariff deal with China.
- Voters have remained evenly divided about their personal financial trends in recent months.
Forty-three percent (43%) of voters rate their personal finances as Good or Excellent.
- Nineteen percent (19%) rate their finances as Poor.
- When President Biden took office in 2021, 48% of voters rated their personal finances as Good or Excellent.
- That fell to 36% when President Trump took office in 2025.
- Sixty-one percent (61%) of the Elite One Percent* rate their personal finances as Good or Excellent.

* Elite Voters are defined as those with a postgraduate degree, make more than $150,000 annually, and live in a densely populated urban area. Elite Adjacent Voters have at least one of these characteristics. Main Street voters have none of these characteristics, and make up the largest portion of voters.

The most recent data cited is from a Napolitan News Service survey of 1,000 Registered Voters conducted online by Scott Rasmussen, October 6-7, 2025. Field work for the survey was conducted by RMG Research, Inc. and has a margin of error of +/- 3.1.