NEW YORK, Oct 13 (Reuters) – Most young Americans have cut their spending in response to persistent inflation over the past year, a Bank of America survey showed on Friday. Seventy three percent of Gen Z consumers between the ages of 18 and 26 have changed their lifestyles because of increased prices, according to a Bank of America (BAC.N) poll of more than 1,100 respondents. Of those, 43% chose to cook at home instead of dining out, 40% spent less on clothes and 33% pared down grocery purchases to the essentials. “Gen Zers are definitely looking for ways to improve their financial health,” said Holly O’Neill, president of retail banking at Bank of America told Reuters. “They are proactively making lifestyle changes to combat inflation. Gasoline and food prices have been rising in the U.S., eroding consumer finances, prompting the Fed to keep interest rates elevated. Bank of America’s CEO Brian Moynihan said last month that consumer cash balances are coming down, even though their finances are healthy. “Consumer repayments still remain strong,” O’Neill added. “From a delinquency perspective, we are still not where we were pre-pandemic. Even though there has been a change in spending and payment behavior, the consumer is still very healthy.” Nearly four out of 10 Gen Z respondents also experienced a financial setback in the last year, prompting them to stop saving or take on more debt. They also remain less optimistic on economic conditions improving. A majority of respondents said the economy was unlikely to improve over the next year. While Gen Z is cutting back, older generations, including Boomers, increased spending as much as 5%, the report showed. Reporting by Nupur Anand and Lananh Nguyen in New York; Editing by Stephen Coates Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. Acquire Licensing Rights, opens new tab Nupur Anand Thomson Reuters Nupur Anand is a U.S. banking correspondent at Reuters in New York. She focuses on JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and regional banks. Anand covered banking and finance in India for more than a decade, chronicling the collapse of major lenders and turmoil at digital banks and cryptocurrencies. She has a degree in English literature from Delhi University and a postgraduate diploma in journalism from the Indian Institute of Journalism & New Media in Bangalore. Anand is also an award-winning fiction writer. Lananh Nguyen Thomson Reuters Lananh Nguyen is the U.S. finance editor at Reuters in New York, leading coverage of U.S. banks. She joined Reuters in 2022 after reporting on Wall Street at The New York Times. Lananh spent more than a decade at Bloomberg News in New York and London, where she wrote extensively about banking and financial markets, and she previously worked at Dow Jones Newswires/The Wall Street Journal. Lananh holds a B.A. in political science from Tufts University and an M.Sc. in finance and economic policy from the University of London.
Young Americans cut spending, shun restaurants as prices rise, study says
