​Most Americans still say they're falling behind

By many measures, the U.S. economy is improving. Yet that apparently isn't being felt by many American families.

About 55 percent of Americans say their income is falling behind the cost of living, according to a poll of consumers released this week by Pew Research. That's hardly budged since a year earlier, when 57 percent of Americans said they were falling behind the cost of living.

Even more troubling, fewer Americans say they are doing better this year compared with their financial situation a year ago. Only 6 percent said their income is going up faster than the cost of living, down slightly from the 7 percent who said last year they were pulling ahead.

The results illustrate the "stubborn skepticism about the strength of the economic recovery, and little evidence that people think that their personal financial fortunes have improved," Pew said in the report.

How Americans view their fortunes may reflect the weak increases in pay that have hampered the recovery that followed the housing crash. Despite a stronger economy and more job creation, wages have barely budged. In fact, the average wage for American workers peaked back in 1973, when the typical employee earned $4.03 an hour, or about $22.41 in today's dollars.

By comparison, the average hourly wage for non-management, private-sector workers stood at just $20.67 in September, or about 7.8 percent below what workers earned more than four decades ago. When considering such dismal long-term trends, it's no surprise that the majority of Americans feel they can't keep up.

Thanks to stagnant wages and the Great Recession, which ate away at home and investment values, many middle class families are still struggling to recover from a tsunami of economic grief. Simply trying to maintain their previous standard of living meant that the middle class has slipped into "dissavings," which happens spending is higher than income.

Even though most Americans feel they're going backwards, more now believe that President Obama's economic policies are boosting the recovery. About 27 percent believe the national economy is now excellent or good, compared with only 16 percent in 2014.

So what explains the gap between how Americans view their personal economic situations versus how they rate the country as a whole? It could be that while they see improvements elsewhere, such as more hiring by their employers, they still aren't benefiting from higher wages.

Some relief may come this year. U.S. workers could see a median salary boost of 3 percent in 2015, according to a survey from human resources firm WorldatWork. While that would represent an improvement, it still wouldn't be back to pre-recession levels.

One group that's likely to see a boost this year are the nation's poorest workers. Thanks to minimum wage hikes in 21 states this year, more than 3 million workers will see bigger paychecks in 2015.