Business Corpus: IBD/TIPP Poll: Economic Optimism IndexThe IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index rose 1.9% in May to 53.6 from 52.6 in April, reversing two monthly declines. The post IBD/TIPP Poll: Economic Optimism Index appeared first on Investor's Business Daily.

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The monthly IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index, a collaboration of Investor's Business Daily and TechnoMetrica, gauges how confident consumers, workers and investors are in the pace and direction of the U.S. economy. As with all of IBD/TIPP's proprietary monthly indexes, a reading above 50 signals optimism, below 50 pessimism.

The IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index is made up of three subindexes, including one for the respondent's outlook six months into the future, the respondent's personal financial outlook, and how the respondent views current federal policies. The goal each month is to give as accurate a reading of the current state of the economy as possible.

The average for the index over the past 17 years has been 49.4, or slightly pessimistic. The index high of 62.9 was reached in March of 2002, six months after the 9/11 attacks, as Americans rallied behind the U.S. response to the terrorist attacks and confidence grew that the post-9/11 economy would not go into recession as widely feared. The index bottomed in August 2011 at 35.8, as the economy struggled to emerge from the financial crisis and key initiatives to boost economic growth had yet to have an impact.

IBD/TIPP also produces the Presidential Leadership Index at the beginning of each month.

See the schedule of upcoming IBD/TIPP poll releases.

IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index: News & Analysis

IBD/TIPP Poll: Investors Are Optimistic; Everyone Else? Not So MuchThe IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index rose further into moderately optimistic territory in May, gaining one point to 53.6. But the positive vibes came mostly from self-described investors. The rest of the country... Read More

IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index: Overall

The IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index rose 1.9% in May to 53.6 from 52.6 in April, reversing two monthly declines. In February, the index hit its highest reading since October 2004. It's the 20th straight month that it has been over 50 — which signals overall optimism about the economy. It is also above its long-term average of 49.4. The index stood at 44.4 in December 2007, the month that the U.S. officially entered a recession.

Six-Month Economic Outlook

The Six-Month Outlook is a forward-looking gauge that looks at how consumers feel about the economy's prospects over the next half year. The index rose 3.2% in May to 51.3 after dropping 6% in April and 8% in March. The volatile gauge surged 11.4% in January. The reading for this index remains in optimistic territory and well above its long-term average of 46.3. This index stood at 32.1 in December 2007, the month the economy fell into recession.

Personal Financial Outlook

The gauge of how Americans feel about their own finances in the next six months inched up 0.5% to 61.0 in May from 60.7 in April, it dropped 4.9%. The index's all-time high of 65.3 was set in January 2004, when the Bush-era tax cuts began to kick in. The Personal Financial Outlook is one of the most consistently optimistic indexes in the IBD/TIPP data set. It remains above its long-term average of 57.1.

Federal Policies

A measure of Americans' confidence in government, the Federal Policies component increased 2.3% in May to 48.5 from 47.4 in April, but was still below its level of 50 in March. It remains above its 17-year average of 44.8. This index briefly moved into optimistic territory in February 2017 for the first time in 10 years, and in March returned to the feel-good zone. But it subsided during recent budget and gun-control debates. Intended to gauge how Americans view government policies put in place by the president, Congress, the courts and the Federal Reserve, the Federal Policies Index has consistently been the least optimistic of the three subindexes that make up the Economic Optimism Index.

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Main IBD/TIPP Poll Page

IBD/TIPP Presidential Approval Index

IBD/TIPP Election 2016 Tracking Poll

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