The Covid pandemic and the currently looming recession have taken a major economic toll on Americans’ savings. According to Northwestern Mutual’s recent 2022 Planning and Progress Study, the average amount of personal savings dropped 15% from $73,100 in 2021 to $62,086 in 2022. The study also shows that the majority of United States adults (60%) say that the pandemic itself has been very disruptive to their finances.

Those polled for the study were polled between February 8th and February 17th of this year and responses from 2,381 adults were recorded.

“There could be several factors contributing to the drop in savings from last year, ranging from spiking inflation to people spending more as they resume some sense of normalcy in their lives.”

Christian Mithcell, Northwestern Mutual's chief customer officer, said.

48% of the respondents have said they have been able to comfortably adapt to the pandemic-fueled finance transition. Three-quarters of the respondents also say that they have also formed better financial habits during the pandemic.

Some of the newly formed habits are:

• Spending less on living costs

• Strictly tackling debt

• Increasing investment and tracking strictly

17% of the respondents regularly revisit their financial plans and 14% of individuals have increased savings and money toward their retirements.

A large chunk of respondents (69%) state that they’replaning to maintain their current savings but there is warnings from Mitchell that this should be reconsidered, “It bears watching because while people say they plan to continue saving at an elevated rate going forward, intentions don’t always follow through to action.”