Consumer Confidence: Americans on the economy: It stinks

Soaring fuel costs, higher grocery bills, declining home prices, and an unstable job market. Those are the main reasons Americans are more pessimistic about the economy than they've been in 16 years, according to the latest Consumer Confidence Index, which is based on a monthly sampling of 5,000 households. In May, nearly 31 percent of respondents said business conditions are "bad," up 4 percentage points from the previous month. And a lot of folks expect more gloom and doom: One in three consumers expects business conditions to worsen over the next six months, while barely one in 10 thinks they'll improve.