As we noted last week, this weekend marked the fifth anniversary of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy. Although the recession had technically started the previous November, that September was when the depths of the financial crisis really hit home. According to Gallup, Americans' economic confidence was already low before the crash, registering at -39 before the Lehman bankruptcy. But a month later, it had plummeted to -65. Today, that reading is still in negative territory, at -16, but it's well above where we were at the Lehman collapse.
Gallup's Standard of Living Index shows a similar trajectory. Standing at 25 before September 2008, it dropped to 12 immediately after the Lehman bankruptcy, but has since risen to 38, or much higher than it was five years ago.
But by some measures, we're still worse off than we were five years ago. In Septmeber of 2008, Americans reported spending an average of $113 on their daily consumer spending. The Lehman shock dropped that figure down to $85. Five years afterward, following a long and difficult recession, the figure has barely budged, at $86 per day.
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