Consumer Pulse (June 4, 2026): Historically Low Sentiment and Selective Spending

May marks the third month in a row that consumer sentiment has fallen. Down 10% month over month and 14.2% year over year, sentiment is now slightly below its previous historic low, seen in June of 2022.

That said, there seems to be a tension between fear of the future and present pain. Consumers appear to feel worse than many current economic indicators would suggest. While the inflation rate is higher than the average over the last two years, it’s half what it was during pandemic highs. Unemployment is relatively low, and the stock market continues to hit all-time highs following a dip at the start of the war with Iran.

Still, consumers’ expectations are deteriorating faster than their personal finances. Of the conversations we’re tracking, 35.8% discuss fear of the future, but don’t indicate present pain, while fewer conversations — only 31.5% — indicate present pain without future fear.

This suggests consumers are mentally preparing for conditions that haven’t fully materialized yet, with anticipatory stress outweighing acute anxiety — and there’s little optimism about circumstances improving.

Here are more key findings from our most recent Online Anthropology™ research.

Key findings

Conversations expressing hope are down for the fifth month in a row. Expressions of hope in household economic situations are at their lowest point across our 3+ years of data, dipping below 3% for the first time to 2.8%.

Inflation conversations have increased in six consecutive months. These conversations now occur 32% more often than they did in January of 2026.

Deal hunting is down as of the end of May to 21.6% from a high of 24.9% in April. This sounds tentatively positive, but given the overall lack of confidence, it likely suggests that consumers are trending toward subtraction (doing without) rather than substitution (finding a cheaper alternative).

Spending is getting more selective. “Cutting back” conversations reached a high of 7.8% in May, up from their 2026 average of 6.7%. There’s more discussion of cutting back on things like casual dining in 2026 vs. larger ticket items like vacations in 2025. Those conversations signal very different things about the state of the American economic mindset and suggest more difficult decisions around everyday expenses.

Budgeting conversations in May 2026 are at their third-highest point in our 3+ years of data. These conversations, which we initially saw surge in May 2025, have grown meaningfully year-over-year and are escalating beyond the plateau established in the back half of 2025.

Budgeting conversations are 21.1% more frequent than in the same January – May period in 2025. This increase suggests that US consumers are price-wary and instituting plans to help mitigate their concerns.

Mentions of AI in household economic conversations hit their second-highest level on record, with 73% of these conversations focused on worries about job security. This is slightly higher than in April, and discussions of AI in employment/economic contexts have consistently been well over 3x more frequent than in similar periods in 2025.

Consumers are feeling more alone. Americans are losing trust in institutions, both governmental and corporate, and are less confident in these systems’ management of the economy.

19.6% of conversations mention government, corporations and employers. Of these discussions, 31% reflect less confidence in those institutions than in the economy at-large. There is a sense that no one is looking out for the American public, which adds to consumers’ sense of impending dread.

Conversations included the following specific insights:

Future fear is outpacing present pain: “[I have a] 50% paid-off mortgage with healthy retirement and emergency fund savings. Wake up every day worried about layoffs and the economy in general. Spend a fortune on day care, and after 10 years of no car payment, we finally needed to buy a car, so have that too. It’s nice not needing to worry if I can spend $30 on something on Amazon, but we live very modestly…”

Safety nets are thin: “Been tracking my expenses for years…and the numbers just don’t add up anymore compared to what our parents had. Even with a decent salary, I’m still choosing between building an emergency fund or actually living — can’t imagine how people with lower income are managing this mess.”

Subtraction over substitution: “I’ve moved on from looking for less expensive options to thinking first, ‘do I really need this right now?’ and the answer is ‘no’ more often than I expected.”

What’s next?

Consumers are feeling alone, but they don’t have to. An insights-driven approach can help your brand meet customers where they are by addressing needs, building connections and strengthening relationships — even in uncertain times.

Material’s proprietary social listening solution, Online Anthropology™, and other quick-turn research methods like Material Spotlight, offer fast, data-rich and insightful snapshots of the trends, topics and concerns consumers are talking about and why.

To learn how Material can help you uncover these kinds of insights and act on them in the moment, reach out today.

Methodology

These findings are based on an Online Anthropology analysis of 28.2 million publicly available, naturally occurring consumer messages posted between January 1, 2023 and May 31, 2026, from 5,688,134 people, about their household economic situations.

The dataset includes dozens of subreddits, Facebook posts and comments, and hundreds of finance-focused forums and message boards like moneysavingexpert.com, mrmoneymustache.com, bogleheads.org, zerohedge.com, redflagdeals.com and more.