A new survey is showing that more and more people are “doom spending”. Doom spending is when you spend money to quiet concerns about things like the economy or the state of the world today.
A recent survey by Intuit Credit Karma found 27% of Americans “doom spend” to cope with stress, especially younger Americans. More than 1 in 3 (37%) of Gen Z said they doom spend and 39% of millennials do.
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When compared to a year ago, 40% of people say they doom spend more now. So, what’s got people shelling out cash in the name of self-soothing?
For a lot of people, as counterintuitive as it may seem, it’s due to concerns about the economy.
The survey found more than a third of people (36%) said they cannot rationalize saving money because of their uncertainty surrounding the world and the economy. Those feelings also impact Gen Z (47%) and millennials (43%) more. It could also explain why about 1 in 5 (19%) people have no savings at all.
The state of the world right now has about 44% of Americans feeling pessimistic about their financial futures. About the same amount (43%) said they gave up on reaching certain financial milestone, like saving any money, paying off debt or upgrading their living situation.
And it seems things are only getting worse. Almost 3 out of 4 people (71%) said they’re more worried about the state of the world now than they were a year ago. In fact, 1 in 10 Americans say they have “zero optimism” for 2025.
