Source page: McKinsey & Company
Commentary
Tempered expectations
North America | Public Sector | Economic Development
July 1, 2022 – Over the past year, Americans have become increasingly pessimistic about their access to economic opportunity—and women are generally more pessimistic than men. These are some of the findings in McKinsey’s recent American Opportunity Survey, which polled 25,000 people across demographic categories including identity, age group, and income level. Click through to see more.
To read the article, see “For many Americans, economic opportunity seems increasingly out of reach,” May 18, 2022.
Interactive
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Visual form
Slide-based demographic dot-plot comparison.
Layout / body structure
The uses one full-screen dot plot per view, with the first visible card labeled Long term and the next labeled National. Each chart is read from top to bottom through demographic groups, while the horizontal axis runs from negative outlook on the left to positive outlook on the right around a neutral 100 midpoint.
What is being compared
The visual compares perceptions of economic opportunity across gender, age, race and ethnicity, income, immigration-generational status, and urbanicity. It also compares March 2021 with March 2022 for each demographic row, so every line segment shows how sentiment shifted over the year.
Measurement system
The horizontal scale is the McKinsey Economic Opportunity Index, where 100 is neutral, values below 100 indicate a negative outlook, and values above 100 indicate a positive outlook. Each row has two points and a connecting segment, so the graphic measures both level and direction of change across the same index scale.
Visible structure inside the graphic
The charts stack many demographic rows, separated into blocks such as gender, age group, race and ethnicity, income, immigration-generational status, and urbanicity. On both the Long term and National cards, the all-respondents line sits just to the right of neutral, while some groups such as Black men are plotted much farther to the positive side and others, such as rural respondents or transgender and nonbinary people, sit much closer to or below neutral.
Main takeaway from the visual
The shows that optimism about economic opportunity has softened broadly, but not evenly. Most of the row segments tilt left from March 2021 to March 2022, and the chart makes the gaps between demographic groups just as visible as the overall decline.
Key standout values or extremes
On the Long term card, Black men sit furthest to the right near the mid-130s, while rural respondents fall much closer to the 80s. On the National card, Black men still lead near the low 120s, many middle groups cluster around 100 to 115, and the overall respondent line sits only modestly above neutral.
Controls / sequence, when applicable
This is a slide-based sequence. The reader advances between different opportunity lenses such as Long term and National, while each card keeps the same demographic dot-plot structure and year-to-year comparison marks.
Companion media, when applicable
There is no separate companion audio or video; the chart is the full visual on this page.