Americans brace for higher gas prices as Iran war squeezes finances

Americans were already bracing for another hit at the pump as the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran stretched into an uneasy ceasefire, with gas prices reaching a four-year high and half of adults saying they expected prices to climb even more. The new warning from households was blunt: for many voters, the fight in the Middle East was not a distant foreign-policy test but an immediate threat to monthly budgets.

An ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll published May 1 found that 40% of Americans said they were not as well off financially as they were when Donald Trump returned to the White House in 2025. Another 23% said they were falling behind financially, while 52% said they had just enough to maintain their standard of living and 24% said they were getting ahead. The survey suggests a country where even modest price shocks are landing on already fragile finances.

The anxiety over gas was especially sharp. Americans said the war had pushed prices to a four-year high, and 65% in an Ipsos poll conducted March 13-15 said they expected gas prices to be worse in a year because of the conflict. In that same poll, 53% said the fighting would hurt their personal financial situation, while 58% disapproved of U.S. military strikes against Iran and 78% opposed sending U.S. ground troops.

That concern has remained broad and durable. An AP-NORC poll found about 59% of Americans said U.S. military action in Iran had gone too far, and 45% said they were extremely or very concerned about affording gas in the next few months, up from 30% in an earlier AP-NORC survey taken shortly after Trump’s reelection. A Pew Research Center survey conducted March 23-29 found higher gas prices were the top concern tied to the Iran war, with 69% worried about that outcome and 64% saying they were not confident Trump could make good decisions on Iran.

Public unease also hardened around Trump’s rhetoric. A large majority in the ABC poll said they reacted negatively to his social media post earlier this month warning, “A whole civilization will die tonight.” The poll’s broader trend line points in the same direction: 4 in 10 Americans now say they are worse off than when Trump became president, up from 33% in February, while only 17% say they are better off, down from 22%.

The politics of the Iran crisis are increasingly being filtered through the pocketbook. For households watching gasoline, groceries and broader financial stress, military action is being judged less as a matter of geopolitics than as another cost that can quickly reach the checkout line.