Nearly 1 in 4 American households living paycheck to paycheck, report reveals
Lower-income families hit hardest as inflation grows faster than wages, Bank of America Institute data shows
Excerpts:
The Bank of America Institute report found that almost 24% of households would be classified as living paycheck to paycheck so far in 2025, an increase of 0.3 percentage points from 2024 – although the growth rate is nearly three times lower than it was a year ago.
It defines living paycheck to paycheck as households spending over 95% of their income on necessities like housing, groceries, gas, utilities, internet plans, public transit and childcare. That leaves them with little or no leftover funds for savings or “nice-to-have” discretionary purchases.
“Although the number of households living paycheck to paycheck is increasing this year, the pace of growth has slowed significantly,” Joe Wadford, an economist at the Bank of America Institute, told FOX Business. “That’s because it seems like a lot of the financial stress that has been increasing has been concentrated in these lower-income households as these families struggle to keep up with cost increases.”
Inflation has grown faster than middle- and lower-income households’ after-tax wages since January 2025, the Bank of America Institute found.
That trend has led to the share of lower-income households living paycheck to paycheck rising to 29% this year, from 28.6% last year and 27.1% in 2023. Among middle- and higher-income households, there has been little to no increase in the proportion living paycheck to paycheck.
“For middle- and lower-income households, I think inflation is the primary driver. Especially this year, we’ve seen the gap between wages and expenses continue to widen for lower-income households,” Wadford said….
The report also found that wage growth for lower-income earners has been easing compared to higher-income counterparts since the start of 2025, after it rose faster in 2021-22, before cooling in 2023-24….
____________________________________
The Leviticus 25 Plan will lower the cost of living and relieve financial distress for millions of working, tax-paying American families through wide-ranging debt elimination dynamics and the billions of dollars in monthly savings in interest-related debt servicing obligations.
The Leviticus 25 Plan will grant direct liquidity transfers to qualifying U.S. citizens through a Fed-U.S.Treasury based Citizens Credit Facility – in the same way that it provided direct liquidity transfers to major Wall Street global financial institutions during the great financial crisis (2008-2010) and the Covid Criiss (2021-2022), that included none other than: Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Bank of America, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, State Street, AIG, Merrill Lynch, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), Barclays, UBS, Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas, and others…
The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens. It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.
The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.
The Leviticus 25 Plan – An Economic Acceleration Plan for America
$95,000 per U.S. citizen – Leviticus 25 Plan 2026 (40818 downloads )
