• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, February 16, 2005

Household Spending Priorities Change Over 50 Years

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as analyzed by American Demographics, while household spending has increased over the last 50 years, spending priorities have changed. More than half goes to the house and car at the expense of food and alcohol, almost five times as much for education, and entertainment as popular as ever.

Average U.S. household Spending Allocation (% of total unadjusted for inflation)

	1950	1960	1972	1984	1993	2003
Total annual HH spend	$3,925	$5,431	$8,601	$21,975	$30,692	$40,817
Housing	25.8%	29.3%	29.4%	30.4%	31.4%	32.9%
Transportation	13.8	15.1	24.0	19.6	17.8	19.1
Food & alcohol	32.5	26.0	22.6	16.2	15.2	14.0
Health care	5.1	6.6	4.7	4.8	5.8	5.9
Entertainment & reading	5.4	4.9	5.2	5.4	5.8	5.4
Apparel	11.5	10.3	8.4	6.0	5.5	4.0
Education	0.4	1.1	1.1	1.4	1.5	1.9
Other	5.5%	6.8%	4.6%	16.3%	17.1%	16.8%

Source: bis.gov and American Demographics Analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data