- 72% of Americans are financially insecure, according to a Bankrate.com survey.
- Americans said they'd need to earn $233,000 to feel financially comfortable and $483,000 to feel rich.
Many Americans aren't dreaming about getting rich — they're just hoping to feel financially secure someday. But most of them are a long way from reaching this goal.
That's according to a June Bankrate.com survey of 2,521 US adults, which found that 72% of Americans considered themselves to be financially insecure. These individuals said they would need to earn, on average, $233,000 per year to think otherwise.
In 2021, the median US full-time worker earned roughly $54,000 per year, per the Census Bureau's American Community survey — only about a quarter of the figure Americans are aspiring for.
To feel rich, those surveyed said they'd need to earn, on average, $483,000 per year, nearly nine-times the median income.
Bankrate analyst Sarah Foster told Insider that several economic factors are likely driving these results.
"Long before inflation surged, Americans had been grappling with a massive increase in the cost-of-living, including but not limited to college tuition, health care and housing," she said. "Americans feeling that they need a major annual six-figure income first to be financially comfortable and about half a million a year on average to feel rich is a direct consequence of the rapid run-up in affording the items they both need and want."
Since the turn of the century, the costs of big middle-class expenditures like childcare, healthcare, college tuition, and housing have risen 115%, 130%, 178%, and 80% respectively as of 2022, well above overall inflation, according to University of Michigan economist Mark Perry's analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
Many Americans surveyed cited insufficient emergency savings and retirement funds as evidence they're not financially secure.
54% of US adults had three months of emergency savings in 2022, according to a May Federal Reserve report, down from 59% in 2021. When it comes to retirement savings, respondents in a Northwestern Mutual survey of Americans conducted earlier this year said they would need an average of $1.27 million to retire comfortably — but the average respondent only had 7% of that saved.
In the Bankrate survey, inflation was named the top factor holding Americans back from improving their finances, followed by the broader economic environment and rising interest rates.
While many Americans may be a long way from feeling financially secure, some are optimistic that they'll get there eventually. Among those who said they were not yet secure, 46% said they expect to reach this goal someday.