The gas price spike drove the University of Michigan’s Index of Consumer Sentiment to the lowest level recorded in its over 73-year history. The index declined by 3.5 points in April, dropping to 49.8, amid the rising prices caused by the Iran war, according to the...
“The Resilience Deficit: Labor Workers in an Automated Economy,” the April 2026 edition of the “Wage to Wallet Index,” is a collaboration between PYMNTS Intelligence, WorkWhile and Ingo Payments. It examines how artificial intelligence and automation are reshaping the economic and job outlooks for lower-income...
Busy parents may be giving global digital commerce its clearest growth signal yet. The data makes a strong case for why merchants should pay attention. That is one of the more actionable findings in “The 2025 Global Digital Shopping Index: The Rise of the Mobile...
Picture two families living four miles apart in the same mid-sized American city. Both earn about $85,000 a year. Both have two kids in elementary school. On paper, they are demographic twins. The first family lives in a neighborhood where the zoned public school has...
Millennials are learning to manage a pileup of costs all at once, and PYMNTS Intelligence data suggests that balancing act is becoming harder even during what should be their prime earning years. That is the central takeaway from the March 2026 PYMNTS Data Book, “The Millennial...
A flat tire, a broken appliance or an urgent dental bill may look like a routine household problem. But for a growing share of Americans, small financial shocks now hit with the force of a crisis because there is little room left in the monthly...
At the checkout counter, the biggest shift may not be how much consumers buy, but where they choose to buy it and which payment tools help them stretch each purchase a little further. In “The New Checkout: Crimped Consumers Lean Into Online Retail and Digital Wallets,” PYMNTS...
The fees charged by condominium associations and homeowners associations are rising along with other items in household budgets, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday (April 9). Between 2019 and 2025, the median monthly cost of condo fees rose 29% to $420, while HOA fees rose...
The new divide in consumer confidence is not whether Americans feel good about the economy, but whether they have enough income to turn that confidence into real spending power. The report, “Income Divides: A Deep Dive on Household Income Differences in U.S. Consumer Expectations,” argues that...