How to Read the Fed's Household Economics Survey (SHED) — Well-Being, Job Worries, Rent and the $400 Question

As of 3 November 2026, 00:34 KST; most recently published report: Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2025, the Federal Reserve Board's report on its 2025 Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking (SHED), dated May 13, 2026 on the survey page checked at 00:34 KST. "The Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking was fielded from October 17 through October 28, 2025." The survey page gives no date for the next report; the sources used give no time of day for the release. Primary source: https://www.federalreserve.gov/publications/2026-economic-well-being-of-us-households-in-2025-executive-summary.htm^[1][3][4]

Comparison basis: values are survey estimates in percent of adults (or of renters where stated) as published, rounded to whole numbers. The 2024 and 2025 values in the table come from the report's accessible figure data, reached from the figure pages of the report and retrieved at 00:42 KST; the changes stated in the text (for example +2 points for rent and +1 point for Buy Now, Pay Later) were used only as a cross-check. Changes are percentage points. The survey is annual, so the previous and year-ago columns are the same comparison. All five pages are Federal Reserve Board publications and count as one source.^[1][2][5]

In three lines

1. The SHED is an annual Federal Reserve online survey of about 13,000 adults on financial well-being, jobs, prices, emergencies, credit, banking and housing.
2. In the 2025 survey, 73% of adults said they were doing okay or living comfortably, unchanged from 2024, while concern about finding or keeping a job rose to 42% from 37%.
3. Hardship measures were mixed: 23% of renters had fallen behind on rent (up 2 points) and 26% skipped medical care because of cost (down from 28%).^[1][2]

"Concerns about finding or keeping a job increased compared with the prior year." "A majority of adults (58 percent) said that changes in the prices they paid compared with the prior year had made their financial situation worse, but this share was down from 60 percent in 2024 and 65 percent in 2023." "Twenty-six percent of adults skipped medical expenses because of cost in the prior year, down from 28 percent in 2024." "Twenty-three percent of renters reported that they had been behind on their rent at some point in the past year, up 2 percentage points from 2024 and 6 percentage points since 2021."^[1]

"In 2025, 49 percent of adults under age 30 lived with a parent." "This share was up by 6 percentage points since 2022, and up 12 percentage points since 2019, just before the pandemic." "One-in-four workers had used generative AI in the prior month as a part of their job." "Sixteen percent of adults did not pay all of their bills in the prior month, and 8 percent said members of their family sometimes or often did not have enough to eat." "Collectively, the total amount of non-credit-card fraud was an estimated $100 billion in 2025, with $56 billion borne directly by consumers."^[1]

The share who said they would cover a hypothetical $400 emergency expense using cash or its equivalent was 63%. "This share was unchanged from the previous three years, but down from a high of 68 percent in 2021."^[1]

Overall vs groups. The overall share doing okay or living comfortably was 73% with a 1-year change of 0, while Table 1 shows -4 points for family income under $25,000 and -3 points for ages 18 to 29. "Black adults saw further declines in financial well-being, with the share doing okay or living comfortably down 5 percentage points from 2024." A stable total and declining groups can coexist because the total averages across groups of different size.^[2]

Minor-or-major vs major concern. Just above 9 in 10 adults called price increases a minor or major concern, unchanged, while the share calling them a major concern declined 3 points. "Price increases as a major concern did decline over this period, though generally remained flat among lower-income and younger adults." For the concerns figure, the report notes: "This question was only asked of a randomized half of the sample." The denominator for those concern shares is therefore the randomized half of respondents asked, weighted to all adults.^[1][2]

Own finances vs the economy. 73% rated their own finances favorably, while about one-fourth of adults rated the national economy good or excellent, down 3 points from 2024 and well below the one-half who did so in 2019. Local economy ratings (45% good or excellent) sit between the two. The report also notes: "Results typically capture financial experiences at the time of the survey or in the 12-month period before the survey rather than the precise calendar year."^[2]

Different baselines. Changes in the report are measured from different years: 1-year changes from 2024, renters behind on rent also since 2021, adults under 30 living with a parent since 2022 and 2019, and the $400 measure against its 2021 high of 68%. A change should be read with its stated base year.^[1][2]

Design effect and response rate vs significance. "The design effect for the 2025 survey with the weights used in this report is 1.14, indicating only modest effects from the sampling methods on the precision of results." The design effect describes precision relative to a simple random sample for the survey as a whole, not a margin of error for any particular figure. "Taking all the stages of recruitment together, the cumulative response rate was 4.1 percent." "After removing a small number of respondents because of high refusal rates or completing the survey too quickly, the final sample used in the report included 12,934 respondents." The report states significance only for some comparisons, for example: "The change from 2024 to 2025 in the share of adults doing okay or living comfortably was not statistically significant among the other three education groups: high school degree or GED, some college/technical or associate degree, and bachelor's degree or more."^[2][3]

Who is represented. "The weighted sample for the 2025 SHED is representative of the estimated 265 million U.S. adults age 18 and older from the March 2025 CPS." The survey is conducted online with a probability-based panel, and the report notes that non-coverage or non-response can still make the sample differ from the population.^[3]