For release: 10:00 a.m. (EDT), Tuesday, August 29, 2017 USDL-17-1175
Technical Information: (202) 691-6900 • CEXInfo@bls.gov • www.bls.gov/cex
Media Contact : (202) 691-5902 • PressOffice@bls.gov
CONSUMER EXPENDITURES--2016
Average expenditures per consumer unit1 for 2016 were $57,311, a 2.4-percent
increase from 2015 levels, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.
During the same period, the Consumer Price Index (CPI-U) rose 1.3 percent2, and
average pre-tax income per consumer unit increased 7.2 percent to $74,664. In
2015, spending increased 4.6 percent from 2014 levels.
Six of the eight major components of household spending increased in 2016, as
shown in table A. Of these, cash contributions expenditures showed the greatest
percentage increase, 14.4 percent. This was followed by expenditures for personal
insurance and pensions, rising 7.6 percent, healthcare, rising 6.2 percent, food
and housing, both rising 2.6 percent, and entertainment, rising 2.5 percent.
Expenditures on transportation fell 4.8 percent, while expenditures on apparel
and services fell 2.3 percent.
Spending patterns by selected component
Expenditures on cash contributions rose again this year, up 14.4 percent after
rising 1.7 percent in 2015.
Personal insurance and pensions expenditures rose 7.6 percent to $6,831. This
was primarily driven by the 8.2-percent increase in pensions and Social Security
expenditures. The non-payroll deposits in retirement plans subcomponent was up
over 26 percent in 2016 and up over 83 percent since 2014. The subcomponent life
and other personal insurance fell 3.3 percent.
Healthcare expenditures rose 6.2 percent. This was primarily driven by increased
health insurance expenditures, up 6.1 percent.
Housing expenditures increased 2.6 percent. The largest subcomponent, shelter,
rose 3.6 percent. The change was driven by rented dwellings, up 6.1 percent.
Owned dwellings, which includes mortgage interest, property taxes, and
maintenance, repairs, and insurance increased 1.4 percent.
Expenditures on the discretionary categories of food away from home and
entertainment continued increasing in 2016, up 4.9 percent and 2.5 percent
respectively, after increasing 7.9 percent and 4.2 percent in 2015.
Transportation expenditures fell 4.8 percent primarily driven by the 9.1-percent
decline in vehicle purchases expenditures and the 8.7-percent decline in gasoline
and motor oil expenditures. Gasoline and motor oil expenditures have declined each
year since 2012. The second largest subcomponent of transportation, other vehicle
expenses, which includes finance charges, maintenance, insurance, and
rentals/leases/licenses, rose 4.6 percent.
Table A. Average expenditures and income of all consumer units and percent
changes for selected components, 2014-16(1)
________________________________________________________________________________
Percent change
Item 2014 2015 2016 2014-2015 2015-2016
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Average income before taxes $66,877 $69,629 $74,664 4.1 7.2
Average annual expenditures 53,495 55,978 57,311 4.6 2.4
Food 6,759 7,023 7,203 3.9 2.6
Food at home 3,971 4.015 4,049 1.1 0.8
Food away from home 2,787 3,008 3,154 7.9 4.9
Housing 17,798 18,409 18,886 3.4 2.6
Shelter 10,491 10,742 11,128 2.4 3.6
Owned dwellings 6,149 6,210 6,295 1.0 1.4
Rented dwellings 3,631 3,802 4,035 4.7 6.1
Apparel and services 1,786 1,846 1,803 3.4 -2.3
Transportation 9,073 9,503 9,049 4.7 -4.8
Vehicle purchases 3,301 3,997 3,634 21.1 -9.1
Gasoline and motor oil 2,468 2,090 1,909 -15.3 -8.7
Other vehicle expenses 2,723 2,756 2,884 1.2 4.6
Healthcare 4,290 4,342 4,612 1.2 6.2
Health insurance 2,868 2,977 3,160 3.8 6.1
Entertainment 2,728 2,842 2,913 4.2 2.5
Cash contributions 1,788 1,819 2,081 1.7 14.4
Personal insurance 5,726 6,349 6,831 10.9 7.6
and pensions
Life and personal
insurance 327 333 322 1.8 -3.3
Pensions and Social
Security 5,399 6,016 6,509 11.4 8.2
All other expenditures 3,547 3,845 3,933 8.4 2.3
(1)Subcategories do not sum to 100%.
________________________________________________________________________________
Spending by composition of consumer unit
Consumer Expenditure Survey (CE) data measure how consumers allocate their spending
among the various components of average annual expenditures. Table B compares the
shares allocated to selected major expenditure categories by composition of consumer
unit in 2016. One parent consumer units with at least one child under 18 allocated
over one-half of their total spending to food and housing, increasing their share for
both categories from 2015 and reported the highest shares of spending on food and
housing among the groups studied.
Over 10 percent of total spending for married couple only consumer units went to
healthcare, over twice as large a share as reported by one parent consumer units
(5.1 percent). Married couple with children consumer units allocated the highest share
of all groups to personal insurance and pensions (12.5 percent), while other married
couple consumer units (those with married couples and persons other than children
living in the consumer unit) allocated the highest share to transportation
(18.6 percent).
Table B. Shares of average annual expenditures on selected major components
by composition of consumer unit, 2016
_____________________________________________________________________________
Item Married Married Other
couple couple married
only with couple
children consumer
units
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Food 11.8 12.9 14.5
Housing 30.5 31.8 30.5
Transportation 17.5 17.3 18.6
Healthcare 10.3 7.3 7.8
Personal insurance and pensions 11.1 12.5 11.6
_____________________________________________________________________________
Item One Single
parent, person
at least, and other
one child consumer
under 18 units
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Food 14.8 12.4
Housing 38.0 36.7
Transportation 17.0 15.9
Healthcare 5.1 7.3
Personal insurance and pensions 7.5 8.9
_____________________________________________________________________________
Spending by income quintile
Table C shows the percent change for expenditures by income quintile. Overall
spending increased in all five quintiles, ranging from 1.6 percent in the highest
quintile to 4.9 percent in the second quintile. Healthcare, personal insurance and
pensions, food away from home, and housing expenditures increased across all income
quintiles. Spending on food at home, apparel and services, and entertainment saw
increases in three of five quintiles. Cash contributions had increases in two of
five quintiles. Transportation expenditures increased by 5.8 percent and 1.2 percent
for the lowest and second quintiles, but declined between 3.5 percent and 9.6
percent for the highest three quintiles.
Table C. Dollar change and percent change in average annual expenditures on
major components by income quintile, 2015-16
______________________________________________________________________________
Lowest Second Third
Item Dollar Percent Dollar Percent Dollar
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Average annual expenditure change:
Total $668 2.7 $1,707 4.9 $1,752
Food 95 2.5 -44 -0.9 425
At home 3 0.1 -158 -4.8 252
Away from home 92 7.2 115 6.6 172
Housing 377 3.8 720 5.6 506
Apparel and services 84 10.9 25 2.2 217
Transportation 208 5.8 69 1.2 -356
Healthcare 226 11.7 105 3.1 301
Entertainment -124 -9.7 45 2.6 126
Cash contributions -154 -21.7 377 35.7 -34
Personal insurance and pensions 53 8.9 26 1.5 247
All other expenditures -97 -4.9 385 17.6 321
______________________________________________________________________________
Third Fourth Highest
Item Percent Dollar Percent Dollar Percent
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Average annual expenditure change:
Total 3.8 $1,239 1.9 $1,713 1.6
Food 7.3 271 3.3 163 1.3
At home 7.3 193 4.3 -117 -1.8
Away from home 7.3 78 2.2 280 4.6
Housing 3.2 279 1.4 626 1.9
Apparel and services 16.6 -25 -1.2 -514 -12.8
Transportation -4.0 -399 -3.5 -1,719 -9.6
Healthcare 7.6 114 2.1 628 8.9
Entertainment 5.7 358 11.7 -31 -0.5
Cash contributions -2.5 1 0.0 1,144 28.0
Personal insurance and pensions 6.2 595 7.8 1,603 9.1
All other expenditures 12.0 45 1.2 -189 -2.2
______________________________________________________________________________
Other available data
Consumer Expenditure (CE) data include the expenditures and income of consumers,
as well as the demographic characteristics of those consumers. Tables with more
expenditure detail are available at www.bls.gov/cex. Published tables provide 2016
CE data by standard classifications that include income quintile, income decile,
income class, age of reference person, size of consumer unit, number of earners,
composition of consumer unit, region of residence, housing tenure, type of area
(urban-rural), race, Hispanic origin, occupation, and highest education level of any
member. A generational table, published as an experimental table since 2014, is
being added as a new standard table this year. It uses the birth year of the
reference person to categorize consumer units into five generational categories
defined by the Pew Research Center. These annual tables include means, shares, and
standard errors. Other tables available on the website include expenditures by age,
region, size, or gender cross-tabulated by income before taxes and other demographic
variables. Historical tables back to 1984 and selected metropolitan area tabulations
are also available.
Future articles in the BLS Beyond the Numbers publication series will highlight recent
trends in prices and spending in the U.S. economy, and will feature 2016 CE data.
Recent CE-specific Beyond the Numbers articles provide analyses of topical economic
issues and long term spending trends, as well as comparisons of CE data to other data
series (see www.bls.gov/cex/csxwebarticles.htm). Other survey information available on
the CE website includes answers to frequently asked questions and a glossary of terms.
Also available are the Interview information booklet and computer assisted personal
interviewing (CAPI) instrument specifications as well as the Diary survey form and
information booklet.
The 2016 CE public-use microdata, including Interview Survey data, Diary Survey data,
and paradata (information about the survey process), are available on the CE website
for download. The Interview files contain expenditure data in two different formats:
MTBI files that present monthly values in an item-coding framework based on the CPI
pricing scheme, and EXPN files that organize expenditures by the section of the
Interview questionnaire in which they are collected. Expenditure values on EXPN files
cover different time periods depending on the specific questions asked, and the files
also contain relevant non-expenditure information not found on the MTBI files. The
public-use microdata for 2016 also includes estimates of state and federal tax
liabilities. The CE introduced these estimates in 2013 to improve the quality of the
tax data. The tax data collected directly from consumer units during the Interview
survey are no longer available. CE public-use microdata from 1996 to 2015 are also
available on the CE website for download. For releases prior to 1996, users can
continue to purchase USB Flash Drives using the public-use microdata order form
(see www.bls.gov/cex/csxform.pdf). Information on the methodology used to calculate and
collect CE data is available at www.bls.gov/cex/ce_methodology.htm. General articles
and research papers using CE data are in the CE research library at
www.bls.gov/cex/research_papers/research-paper-catalog.htm.
For further information, contact the Division of Consumer Expenditure Surveys, Office
of Prices and Living Conditions, Bureau of Labor Statistics at cexinfo@bls.gov or
(202) 691-6892. Information in this release is available to sensory impaired individuals
upon request. Voice phone: 202-691-5200; Federal Relay Service: 1 (800) 877-8339.
1 Consumer units include families, single persons living alone or sharing a
household with others but who are financially independent, or two or more
persons living together who share expenses.
2 This is calculated as the percentage change between the annual average CPI-U
for all items for 2016 (240.007) and the annual average CPI-U for all items for 2015
(237.017). See CPI Detailed Report, Data for January 2017, Table 24.
United States Department of Labor
