Americans are feeling good entering 2020
Bottom Line: Literally. While many stories about New Year’s Resolutions and the like make the rounds, I wanted to examine the other end of the spectrum. For starters, I’ve never been a believer in New Year’s Resolutions because meaningful change doesn’t simply occur based on the change of a date on a calendar. According to Time the top three resolutions of the past decade were to lose weight, exercise more and eat healthier. They all have one theme in common. Health. Here’s the good news for most of us entering the new year. We feel pretty good.
According to Gallup...
- 71% feel positive about our physical and mental health
- Only 7% feel negatively about either
And it turns out, a significant reason we feel better about our physical and mental health, is due to the size of paychecks. It might sound like an odd connection but consider this...positive view of health based on earnings:
- $100k+: 87%
- $40k-$99k: 77%
- Under $40k: 54%
With the average full-time income now above $50,000 for the first time, it makes sense as to why more Americans are feeling better generally about life. And when you think about the most common resolutions, that are most commonly broken, there’s a potential connection as well. The best and fastest way to improve anything in life is to reduce or stop doing the bad stuff. Feeling financially confident likely leads to less anxiety, which leads to less binge eating and drinking, which leads to losing weight (or at least not gaining), which may lead to us having more energy and greater motivation to get some more exercise. It’s interesting how many aspects of life can be positively impacted by having a record economy. Here’s to feeling good about the new year!