In Mass., the middle class is holding on, but financial anxiety continues to climb

May 6, 2026

By Jennifer SMith

For many residents, the Bay State has a “good on paper” problem. Massachusetts is well-educated, well-insured, well-employed, and relatively prosperous.

It is also very expensive. People here can have a nice life – if they can afford it.

In a new poll on the middle class, Massachusetts residents report financial anxiety, driven by a cost of living that feels difficult to manage even for people who say they have relatively good standards of living. The state has preserved its middle class, or at least the proportion of people who identify themselves as middle class, but few residents describe having the kind of financial flexibility to think much beyond paycheck-to-paycheck.

The survey of 854 Massachusetts residents (Topline | Crosstabs) conducted for CommonWealth Beacon and WBUR by the MassINC Polling Group finds that most people still describe their quality of life as decent — 69 percent rate it good, very good, or excellent. But that assessment is shot through with precarity.

Forty-two percent say they are worse off financially than they were a year ago. Forty percent expect to be worse off a year from now.

Over the last decade and change, the self-described class composition of Massachusetts has barely budged. About 40 percent of residents identify as middle class, 32 percent as working class, 13 percent as upper middle class, and 11 percent as poor — figures nearly identical to what The MassINC Polling Group found when it first asked the question in 2003. The middle class has not collapsed.

But residents have growing doubts about whether the state is structured in their favor. And affordability remains the buzzword of the moment as Gov. Maura Healey and her GOP challengers battle it out over plans to manage energy, health care, transportation, and housing costs.

For residents like Cherise Kenner, life hovering around the middle class is “just stressful in general, especially living in Massachusetts. Costs are high, high taxes, even the deduction from my paycheck seems high, and that comes with stress,” she said. “I do the best that I can.”

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