SURVEY: U.S. Parents Expect To Spend Double On School Supplies And Nearly 50% Will Need Help

It’s August, and that means a month away from the kids going back to school. But down in the States, they’re going back much sooner.

For the second year in a row, Savings.com conducted a study to gauge parents back-to-school plans. They asked 500 parents of school aged kids about back to school shopping and found that Parents expect to spend nearly $700 on average on school supplies for the 2022-23 school year.

A lot has changed in the two years Savings.com has conducted such a survey, including the rising cost of gasoline and other essentials amid inflation. One in four parents surveyed in 2021 thought they’d spend under $150 on all their school-supply needs. This year, only 11% believe they’ll spend that much, according to the survey.

Some 44% expect to spend more this year than in 2021. Clothing and footwear appear to represent the bulk of the spending, Savings.com found, averaging $160 per child. The return to in-person learning was key to the extra need for school-appropriate clothes.

Key findings in the back-to-school survey:

• Parents expect to spend a total of $697 on average on school supplies for the 2022-23 school year.
• Almost four in 10 parents plan to spend over $600 on back-to-school shopping this year; only 6% of parents expected to spend that much last year.
• Almost half of parents feel inflation will impact their ability to buy everything their child needs.
• Nearly half — 44% — of parents plan to seek assistance for back-to-school purchases.

Several states offer tax-free or tax-reduced periods where parents get a break in sales tax on certain back-to-school items as a way to help. Illinois will offer reduced tax shopping Aug. 5-14, thanks to Senate Bill 157 that lowers the tax rate on clothes and school supplies by 5%. Certain clothing or footwear item must be less than $125, according to NBCChicago.

Savings.com surveyed 530 adults who have children attending K-12 schools, with a median family income between $50,000-$74,999. The survey was conducted online in July 2022.

Consider this a heads up that if you have the ability to help out a back-2-school charity, there are a lot of people who could use it.

Source: https://bit.ly/3cLiUtt