Reassessing the Relationship Between Consumer Sentiment and Spending with a New Composite Index

creator Brave, Scott Anthony 8382 creator Henken, Benjamin 25548 creator Jolley, Katherine 26019 <p>Surveys summarizing consumer sentiment (or confidence) have a long tradition in economics. In the U.S., the University of Michigan’s Surveys of Consumers and the Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Survey represent two prominent surveys of this nature, with histories that extend back more than 40 years. In this Chicago Fed Letter, we take a closer look at the link between these traditional measures of consumer sentiment and consumer spending. In doing so, we show how related daily measures of consumer sentiment can be used to correct for potential biases in the University of Michigan’s Index of Consumer Sentiment and construct a composite index—called the Composite Consumer Sentiment Index, or C-CSI—that correlates more closely with consumer spending.</p> eng Reassessing the Relationship Between Consumer Sentiment and Spending with a New Composite Index No. 521 https://doi.org/10.21033/cfl-2026-521 periodical 2026-06-04 June 4, 2026 730210 2026-06-24 12:50:01 2026-06-04 11:15:49 item 3 files born digital application/pdf application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/chicago-fed-letter-5287/reassessing-relationship-consumer-sentiment-spending-a-new-composite-index-730210 https://iiif.slf.digirati.io/presentation/item/730210 https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/api/item/730210 https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/docs/historical/frbchi/fedletter/frbchi_fedletter_2026_521.pdf https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/docs/historical/frbchi/fedletter/frbchi_fedletter_2026_521_appendix.pdf https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/docs/historical/frbchi/fedletter/frbchi_fedletter_2026_521_data.xlsx https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/files/text/historical/frbchi/fedletter/frbchi_fedletter_2026_521.txt https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/files/text/historical/frbchi/fedletter/frbchi_fedletter_2026_521_appendix.txt https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/files/text/historical/frbchi/fedletter/frbchi_fedletter_2026_521_data.xlsx 5287 Chicago Fed Letter creator Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Research Department 8444 contributor Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago 516 For more information on rights relating to this item, please see: https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/chicago-fed-letter-5287/reassessing-relationship-consumer-sentiment-spending-a-new-composite-index-730210