Like Longmore, many parents — regardless of income — are finding that their tuition doesn’t stretch as far as it used to. Inflation is at its highest in decades, and prices for groceries, gasoline, household goods, and just about everything needed around the house are rising. Only 36% of parents said they could afford everything their children needed this school year. according to Morning Consult’s annual Back-to-School Shopping Report. That’s a sharp decline from 52% in 2021, when inflation was lower and stimulus checks and prepayments of child tax credits helped some families.
“My shopping habits have changed significantly,” said Longmore, a human resources professional who lives in the Poconos, Pennsylvania, with her husband and five children.
The Longmores earn more than $100,000 a year, well above the average US household income of nearly $65,000. But with five young children, the family’s expenses are also well above average, and Longmore said it’s not enough to keep their household comfortably running – a problem highlighted in the back-to-school season, as four of the couple’s children are of school age.
“Not everyone has everything new, [and] not everyone could get everything,” Longmore said. For example, the 12-year-old opted for new clothes instead of a new backpack and stationery. The younger children inherit the siblings’ backpacks and desks, which still have life in them.
Other families are likely to make similar choices.
According to estimates by consulting firm Deloitte and the National Retail Federation, parents are expected to spend approximately $661 to $864 on K-12 school supplies for the 2022-23 school year.
“Families see back to school and college items as an essential category and they are taking every step possible to purchase what they need for the upcoming school year,” said NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay. Those sacrifices can include buying off-brand items, chasing sales and reducing discretionary spending, he said.
Some families face these challenges again and again at the beginning of the school year. But that’s something Longmore isn’t used to.
“It’s been at least 20 years since I’ve had to retire on this scale,” she said. “This is a new and humbling experience for me as an adult.”
Exhausted
The cuts proposed by the NRF could help, but they may not be enough to help every family afford what their kids need for school — even if retailers like Walmart (WMT), Target (TGT), Kohl’s (KSS) and others are slashing the prices of goods to reduce their bloated inventories.
Wisconsin mother-of-four Molly Schmitz said she often recycles supplies from the previous year, as Longmore did.
She invests in Lands’ End Lifetime Guarantee backpacks and carefully plans her purchases. “I’m starting at dollar stores, followed by Walmart and Target, although even the dollar stores have increased their prices to $1.25,” she said, adding that she bought a lot of supplies for her three school-age children for less than $50 total. Longmore shopped more at Walmart and Target for better discounts, particularly on children’s clothing and shoes. Still, her credit card debt “isn’t looking good right now,” she said.
She is hardly alone.
Morning Consult polled “consumers every two weeks, and what set off alarm bells for me was the increase in the number of parents who feel like they won’t be able to afford all the school supplies this year,” said Claire Tassin, a retailer – and e-commerce analyst at market data intelligence firm.
Single-income or single-parent families can feel particularly vulnerable.
Guen Corrigan, who lives in rural Maine, said her daughter — a single mother — told her she shopped for clothes and shoes at thrift stores and bought groceries for lunch. But when Corrigan asked her about school supplies, “it was clear my daughter had overlooked this in her budget,” she wrote in an email comment to CNN Business.
Corrigan stepped in and bought $140 worth of supplies for her granddaughter and said she’s excited to help her hard-working daughter. But she worries about schoolchildren who don’t have grandparents to help them.
In addition to parents, teachers are also concerned about being able to properly prepare their classrooms for the new school year. Many spend their own money on supplies, and those in low-income counties often purchase items for their students.
Cynthia Angell, a sixth-grade teacher living in Tracy, California, feels less able to financially support her class of mostly low-income students. “I have provided students with school supplies for the past few years. I won’t be able to do that this year,” Angell said in an email to CNN Business.
She hopes families with financial means will donate school supplies, “but I expect parents can only help to a limited extent,” Angell said, adding that she fears the problems will disproportionately affect students from low-income families will.
“So do I limit what we do for the sake of justice, or do I ask for help, or do I give up my own needs to help the students?” Angell said. “I guess the answer is yes to all three.”
Longmore, the Poconos’ mother, tries to find the silver lining to skimping and sacrifice: “I think it will build character and teach my kids to cut waste and stay on a budget.”