Coloradans aren’t feeling good about the state of their pocketbooks this year, with three of the top four issues on their minds in a new survey directly related to the cost of necessities.
The annual Pulse Poll, conducted for the Colorado Health Foundation and released Wednesday, found 89% of surveyed residents said the cost of housing was an “extremely serious” or “very serious” problem, making it the biggest concern in the state.
Other top concerns were:
Cost of living: 86% deemed it an extremely or very serious problem
Homelessness: 79%
Cost of health care: 68%
Drug overdoses: 65%
Crime: 59%
Mental health: 59%
Jobs and the economy: 57%
Illegal immigration: 53%
“This year’s Pulse Poll results don’t just show that Coloradans perceive housing issues as a problem — they see them as a crisis,” Dave Metz, president of Democratic-aligned FM3 Research, said in a news release. The foundation typically hires one Democratic pollster and one Republican pollster to work together on the report.
This year’s poll surveyed about 2,400 Colorado adults in May and June.
Respondents listed cost of living and housing affordability as the two top issues in the state when they were allowed to give any answer, followed by government and politics, homelessness and immigration.
About seven out of 10 respondents said they were “very worried” or “somewhat worried” that they wouldn’t be able to afford to live in Colorado in the future. People with lower incomes were more likely to say they might not be able to afford to live here at some point, though more than half of those who reported earning at least $150,000 a year said the same thing.
Even more people thought Colorado might not be an option for their children: 90% of those who had at least one child under 18 said they were “very worried” or “somewhat worried” that their kids wouldn’t be able to afford to live in the state.
About 39% of people said they felt they were worse off than a year earlier, while 25% felt better off. The numbers were similar to 2023 and 2022, when 40% and 43%, respectively, felt they were worse off.
One-third of people said they worried about losing health insurance in the next year, and roughly the same percentage said they might not be able to afford all the food they and their families need. One person could report multiple financial concerns.
“In August 2020, the first year of our Pulse Poll, at a time when the economy had been jarringly disrupted, Coloradans were evenly divided over whether they were faring better or worse financially,” Lori Weigel, principal of Republican-aligned New Bridge Strategy, said in a news release. “But today, they are more likely to say they are worse off financially by a 14-point margin. Almost all of that feeling is attributable to the exploding concerns about the cost of living — be that housing, health coverage or food.”
Nearly three-quarters of respondents said that increasing the number of higher-paying jobs in their communities would help address their financial concerns.
Other ideas that had some support included:
Increasing access to education and job training: 57%
Providing support to help people manage debt and improve credit: 53%
Making child care more available and affordable: 43%
Reducing discrimination and bias in hiring: 41%
The initially released data didn’t include what residents thought of specific ideas to reach those general goals, though.
“With housing affordability once again at the top of Coloradans’ concerns in 2024, we’re clearly hearing that people are not yet feeling relief from all the state and local policy changes that have sought to address this critical issue in our state,” Kyle Rojas Legleiter, senior director of policy at the Colorado Health Foundation, said in a news release.
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Originally Published: July 17, 2024 at 6:00 a.m.
