How Americans, Europeans See the Economic Future
We looked at two measures of consumer confidence: the University of Michigan’s Index of Consumer Expectations (part of its broader monthly surveys of consumer sentiment) and the European Consumer Confidence Indicator, produced by Eurostat, the EU’s statistical research office. While the two metrics are broadly similar, they’re calculated differently and reported on different scales. The UMich index is derived from three questions on personal financial expectations a year from now and expectations for the U.S. economy one and five years out, relative to a 1966 base year. The EU metric is the average of the answers to four questions covering expectations for household finances, general economic conditions, unemployment and personal savings over the next 12 months.
Despite some ups and downs, the U.S. expectations index generally has been trending modestly upward since the beginning of 2012; October’s preliminary reading of 78.4, in fact, was the second-highest since the official end of the Great Recession. (Not that Americans are ready to throw the economy a parade: In August, a Pew Research Center survey found that 54% of the public expected national economic conditions to be about the same a year from now, while 22% expected conditions to be better and the same percentage expected them to be worse.)
How Americans, Europeans See the  | Economic Future  | 78.4  | 80  | 70  | 66.6  | U.S Index of Consumer  | 60  | Expectations  | 50  | Jan. Apr July Oct. Jan. Apr. July Oct.  | '13  | '13  | '13  | '13  | 114  | '14 '14  | '14  | Jan. Apr July Oct. Jan. Apr. July Oct.  | '13  | 13  | '13  | '13 114 '14 '14  | 14  | o  | -10  | 4  | European Consumer  | -20  | European Confidence Indicator  | 21.8  | -30  | Sources: University of Michigan/Reuters: Eurostat  | PEW RESEARCH CENTER 