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Key Takeaways

• A recent Gallup survey showed that a majority of Americans see the stock market rising, inflation slowing and employment improving in 2025.

• However, more than half said they don’t expect the new year to be an economically prosperous one.

• The survey was divided along political lines. Republicans expressed optimism over incoming President-elect Donald Trump, Democrats raised worries, and independents delivered mixed views of the economic environment.

Americans are optimistic about the stock market, employment rates and inflation in the coming year, but they still aren’t convinced that economic prosperity is at hand, a recent survey shows.

Overall, 66% of survey respondents expected the stock market to rise in 2025, while another 54% believe the year will produce full or increasing employment levels, according to a recent Gallup survey. A narrower majority of 52% believe that prices will rise at reasonable levels, even as inflation moved lower in 2024 but remained above the Federal Reserve’s target level of 2%.

Despite that positive sentiment, the poll showed that a majority of Americans aren’t anticipating a prosperous year, with 56% saying they expect 2025 to be a year of economic difficulty.

Contributing to those concerns are worries that the federal budget deficit will increase, which bothers 62% of those surveyed, while half of the respondents anticipate that taxes will move higher over the year.

Economic Perceptions Divided By Politics

The survey showed that politics influences people's views of the economy. Republicans showed far more enthusiasm than Democrats or political independents, with 78% foreseeing economic prosperity coming this year, while only 40% of independents and 15% of Democrats expressed similar opinions.

Optimistic about Donald Trump's reelection, more than 80% of Republicans said that taxes will fall, employment will increase, inflation will cool, and the stock market will rise in the coming year.

“Trump’s victory in November has energized Republicans and has undoubtedly contributed to their broadly positive expectations for the year ahead,” the Gallup report said. “Across the 13 dimensions, Republicans’ positive predictions are 30 to 79 percentage points higher than they were two years ago, while Democrats’ are between five and 59 points lower.”

However, independents only made positive predictions for the stock and labor markets; otherwise, they held negative views of the future of the economy.

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