Utah’s consumer sentiment decreased by 1.3 percent in February to 80.3, according results of the Survey of Utah Consumer Sentiment released by the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah. However, the institute noted that the decrease was not deemed statistically significant.
A similar survey by the University of Michigan found that sentiment declined 2.7 percent among Americans as a whole during the same time.
“Although the Utah consumer sentiment declined in February, Utah sentiment continues to exceed the U.S. sentiment, indicating Utahns have more confidence in the economy than their peers across the nation,” said Phil Dean, chief economist at the Gardner Institute. “Utahns’ expectations for general economic conditions in Utah and the U.S. over the next five years results in scores of 122 and 84, respectively, suggesting an optimistic outlook among Utah residents for the state’s economy compared to the broader national landscape.”
The Utah consumer confidence survey uses key questions from the University of Michigan’s Survey of Consumers. These questions measure residents’ views of the present economic situation and their expectations for the economy in the future. Data gathered from the key questions are used to create the consumer confidence index for Utah. Demographic questions are included in the questionnaire to allow for additional analysis of the data and to assess the representativeness of the sample.
The full results of the survey are available online at the Gardner Institute website, https://gardner.utah.edu.