Nearly half of Mainers have reported that their household is in a worse financial condition compared to this time last year — including 62 percent of Independents and 86 percent of Republicans — according to a recent Pine Tree State Poll, a States of Opinion Project conducted by the University of New Hampshire (UNH) Survey Center.
The same was said, however, by just 15 percent of Maine Democrats, while 53 percent said they were “about the same.”
Nearly one-third of Democrats indicated that they were better off than last year, compared to just 5 percent of Independents and 4 percent of Republicans.
At the same time, 55 percent of Mainers believe that a recession is very or somewhat likely at some point in the coming year. Just 34 percent feel that it is not very likely or not likely at all. 10 percent said that they believe the U.S. economy is already in a recession.
Although the share of Mainers who expect a recession within the next twelve months is down slightly compared to last year, the six percent decrease appears to have been roughly split between those who do not feel a recession is likely and those who believe the county is already experiencing a recession.
Fifty-eight percent of Mainers reported struggling either somewhat or a lot to afford basic necessities over the past year.
This is down slightly from the 64 percent who reported the same thing in a UNH poll conducted around this same time last year.
Households making less than $75,000 a year most frequently reported having trouble covering their basic expenses, coming in at 69 percent.
Forty-five percent of those making between $75,000 and $150,000 also said that they struggled to afford their necessities over the past twelve months.
When broken down by political affiliation, a stark contrast emerges between the responses of Democrats and those of Republicans and Independents.
While roughly 80 percent of both Republicans and Independents reported struggling to cover their expenses, just 32 percent of Democrats had the same experience.
About half of Mainers expect their financial condition to be about the same a year from now, while the remaining half are split between pessimism and optimism.
When breaking these figures down by party affiliation, however, a four-times greater share of Democrats feel that they will be better off in a year than either Republicans or Independents.
Just 7 percent of Independents and 10 percent of Republicans expect their financial situation to improve over the next twelve months, compared to 38 percent of Democrats.
Among those who said they believed their financial situation would improve over the next year, the most commonly cited reason for this was an expected higher personal income (25 percent), closely followed by the expectation that Democrats will be in power (19 percent) and declining inflation (12 percent).
Of these top three reasons, however, the only one cited by a substantial percentage of Republicans was an expected higher personal income.
Reasons more commonly reported by Republicans, however, were expected lower personal expenses (33 percent) and, most notably, an expectation that Republicans will be in power (43 percent).
Among those who said they believe their household will be worse off financially by next year, inflation and the cost of living were both cited by 22 percent. 14 percent also noted the expectation that Democrats will be in power as reason for their bleak outlook.
Democrats were most likely to cite inflation as the reason for their negative economic outlook (78 percent), while Republicans were spread relatively evenly across several causes, including inflation (24 percent), cost of living (22 percent), and the expectation that Democrats will be in power (21 percent).
Independents most frequently mentioned the cost of living as their reason for believing they will be worse off financially (26 percent), followed by an amalgamation of other, unspecified concerns (21 percent).
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