A persistent question runs through every consumer spending forecast: Are Americans feeling better or worse about their financial lives? The answer, as of February 2026, depends almost entirely on how much they earn, not their views on the economy or the job market.
The inaugural PYMNTS Consumer Expectations Index (PCEI) offers a data-driven look at this phenomenon. Fielded monthly among a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults, the PCEI measures consumer sentiment across three interconnected dimensions: personal financial resilience, macroeconomic and buying climate and labor market security. Each dimension is scored on a 0-to-100 scale, with 50 representing a neutral reading. Scores higher than 50 indicate net-positive sentiment; scores below signal net-negative territory.
The results present a striking picture. Across all dimensions of the index, household income is the dominant variable. It shows that monthly income is the primary fault line in U.S. consumer sentiment. The 15-point gap separating the highest- and lowest-earning households has been consistent across five consecutive months of data, spans every dimension the index measures and shows no sign of closing. The big picture is that the U.S. consumer is not a monolith; by income, they comprise at least four distinct groups, each operating under fundamentally different financial conditions.
Income and Consumer Sentiment
The gap between higher- and lower-earners is hardening.
The headline numbers from February 2026 tell a clear story. Consumers who earn $150K or more a year had an overall PCEI score of 63.1, placing them firmly in positive territory. Those earning less than $50K annually registered a score of 48.0, below neutral and barely changed from October 2025. Consumers earning between $100K and $150K closely track the top earners, while those earning between $50K and $100K have hovered in the mid-50s throughout the measurement window.
All groups experienced a mild dip in November 2025, followed by partial recovery through December and into the new year. That shared pattern might suggest convergence, but the data does not support that conclusion. The spread between the highest and lowest income groups has ranged from 11 to 15 points over the entire five-month period, with no narrowing trend.
The persistence of the gap matters as much as its size. A sentiment divide that compresses over time signals shifting conditions, while one that holds its shape across multiple measurement cycles signals a structural difference. Households earning less than $50K have remained below neutral every single month, suggesting that constrained spending capacity is not a temporary condition for this segment but a persistent one.
Financial Resilience
Regardless of their income, consumers are treating debt management as a necessary competency.
The personal financial resilience subindex captures variables most directly tied to household spending capacity: current financial condition, debt management, savings, emergency liquidity and future expectations. This dimension showed some of the starkest income-based divergences in the entire index.
The two measures with the widest gaps are also the most operationally significant. Emergency readiness, which measures confidence in the ability to cover roughly $1,200 in unexpected expenses within a week, sits at 75 for those earning $150K or more and just 41 for those earning less than $50K, a difference of 34 points. Current financial situation, a retrospective measure of whether household finances have improved, shows a 20-point gap. Consumers earning less than $50K scored 40, and those earning $150K or more scored 60. Both readings indicate meaningful strain at the lower end of the income spectrum.
Debt burden confidence presents the smallest gap at 18 points, with consumers earning less than $50K scoring 62. That relative strength is notable. Across income tiers, consumers appear to have internalized debt management as a necessary competency. The challenge for lower-income households is that confidence in managing debt does not translate into the same kind of financial cushion that savings and emergency liquidity provide for higher earners.
Consumer Annual Household Incomes of Less Than $50K: Stability That Masks Growing Stress
With a financial resilience subindex of 49, households earning less than $50K sit at the edge of neutral, technically not negative, but with no real buffer to speak of. The internal composition of that score is more troubling than the number itself. The current financial situation subindex came in at just 40 in February 2026, down from 42 in October 2025. Emergency readiness has remained in the high 30s to low 40s throughout the measurement window.
What keeps the headline subindex near 50 is relatively solid debt burden confidence at 62. In practical terms, these households are managing their obligations on paper while operating without meaningful savings or the capacity to absorb financial shocks. The future financial situation subindex, at 53, and the savings confidence subindex, at 50, offer little forward visibility. If prices intensify or a job disruption occurs, there is almost no margin to absorb the impact before spending behavior changes.
Consumer Annual Household Incomes of $150K or More: Resilience Backed by Real Financial Capacity
At 69 on the financial resilience subindex, households earning $150K or more operate with a fundamentally different relationship to financial risk. Emergency readiness at 75 and debt burden confidence at 80 indicate that unexpected expenses and ongoing obligations both feel manageable. Current financial situation at 60 and savings at 64 confirm that this group’s optimism is grounded in actual household balance sheet strength.
There was a momentary softening in November 2025, when the current financial situation subindex dipped to 55, suggesting that even high earners felt a temporary tightening. But the recovery was swift and more complete than that of lower-income groups. Future financial situation sits at 67 points, indicating sustained confidence in the months ahead. For companies targeting this segment, the PCEI data suggests that higher-income consumers remain prepared and willing to spend, even in an uncertain environment.
Labor Market Security and Mobility
Personal job security scores in February 2026 range from 80 to 86, suggesting widespread consumer confidence in employment security.
The labor market security subindex data reveals a counterintuitive finding. When it comes to perceived security in their current jobs, workers across all income groups are remarkably aligned. Personal job security scores in February 2026 range from 80 for consumers earning less than $50K to 86 for those earning $150K or more, a narrow band that suggests broad confidence in current employment continuity regardless of earnings.
Job mobility, however, fractures sharply along income lines. This measure captures how confident workers are in their ability to quickly replace their income if they had to, and it tells a very different story than job security does. Workers earning less than $50K score just 40 on job mobility, the lowest reading in the labor market security data. Those earning $150K or more score 54 and rising. That 14-point gap has concrete behavioral implications: Low-income workers who feel locked into their current positions may exhibit more precautionary saving and reduced discretionary spending as a hedge against a job disruption they believe they could not easily recover from.
Consumer Annual Household Incomes of Less Than $50K: Job Attachment
With a labor market security subindex of 63, consumers earning less than $50K are in positive territory overall. Personal job security sits at 80, and contextual job security is at 70, confirming that these workers feel their current employment is reasonably stable. The underlying vulnerability comes from the mobility side of the equation.
Job mobility has remained at 40 each month in the measurement window. The combination of high job attachment and low labor market flexibility creates a fragile equilibrium: Spending holds as long as the job holds. A disruption with no clear path to comparable income would quickly translate into financial stress and behavioral pullback.
Consumer Annual Household Incomes of $150K or More: Growing Mobility Confidence
The security picture for consumers earning $150K or more has shown the most consistent improvement of any group in the dataset. The subindex climbed from 63 in October 2025 to 71 in February. Personal job security reached 86, its highest reading in the series. More significantly, job mobility rose from 49 to 54 in the same period, crossing from slightly negative into modestly positive territory.
That trajectory matters for how these consumers think about risk. A worker who believes they can quickly replace their income if needed will approach discretionary spending decisions differently than one who feels trapped in their current position. For those earning $150K or more, improving mobility confidence reinforces the financial cushion the resilience data already shows. Even a hypothetical job disruption carries less financial weight when the consumer is confident they can land on their feet.
Conclusion
Five months of PCEI data produces a consistent and commercially important finding: Income is the primary lens through which U.S. consumer sentiment must be understood. Across every dimension the index measures, the gradient runs in one direction. More income produces more confidence, more resilience, more flexibility and more spending capacity.
For commercial decision-making, the PCEI income split is not a background demographic footnote. The gap is 15 points wide, structurally persistent and visible across every dimension of the index. Companies designing products, pricing strategies or customer communications around an average consumer are designing for a person who does not exist. The PCEI data reveals that the U.S. consumer comes in at least four distinct income-defined varieties, each with a different relationship to financial risk, labor market security and spending readiness.
Methodology
“Income Divides: A Deep Dive on Household Income Differences in U.S. Consumer Expectations” is taken from the inaugural installment of the PYMNTS Consumer Expectations Index (PCEI), a PYMNTS Intelligence exclusive series. The report is based on a survey of 2,304 consumers conducted from Feb. 6, 2026, to Feb. 12, 2026. The sample was balanced to match the U.S. adult population by age, gender, education and income.
The PCEI examines consumer sentiment along 11 dimensions organized into three subindices:
- Personal Financial Resilience: Household financial trajectory and capacity to manage obligations and absorb a near-term shock.
- Macroeconomic and Buying Climate: Outlook for the national economy and whether conditions support major household purchases.
- Labor Market Security: Perceived income continuity risk and perceived ease of replacing income, covering both employees and the self-employed.
All scores are reported on a 0-to-100 scale, where 50 represents a neutral reading. Scores higher than 50 indicate net-positive sentiment; scores lower than 50 indicate net-negative sentiment. Color coding throughout the data tables follows this convention: green for scores of 60 and higher, yellow for scores between 50 and 59 and red for scores less than 50.
