Federal Reserve Bank of New York introduces the Credit Insecurity Index and finds access to affordable credit improved from 2018 to 2023 but over one in 10 still rely on high-cost debt

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York published “Credit Insecurity in the United States, 2018–2023,” introducing a Credit Insecurity Index to measure geographic access to credit across national, state, city, town, and county levels. The report finds the share of people living in counties with the easiest access to affordable credit increased over 2018–2023, but more than one in 10 people still live in counties where large shares of consumers rely on high-cost credit and struggle to manage debt. By 2023, counties with the strongest access to affordable credit covered about 39% of the U.S. population, with a further 31% in the second-highest tier and 18% in the mid-tier. Around 8% lived in counties where a relatively high share of residents struggle to access affordable credit, and about 5% lived in counties with the least access. Nationally, more people had a credit score or credit file in 2023 than five years earlier, and the share of credit-constrained people fell. Tier positioning was persistent, with around 60% of counties (199 million people) in the same tier in 2023 as in 2018, and two in three “credit insecure” counties remaining insecure; of the 16.6 million people living in credit-insecure counties in 2022, 5.8 million were in rural areas. The index combines the share of adults without a credit score or credit file and the share of adults who are credit-constrained due to factors including low credit scores, delinquent payment history, over-utilized credit lines, or lack of revolving credit, and the New York Fed also released an Excel workbook with index data for states, counties, and cities for 2018–2023.