The Consumer Comfort Index among Americans with household incomes of $100,000 or more hit a nearly one-year high of 70.1 on its 0-100 scale this week, surging 11.6 points in the past month to its best since before the index’s unprecedented pandemic-spurred drop last spring. It’s nearly half that, 36.5, among those earning less than $50,000, with no consistent gains in this group since mid-October.

In all, the CCI among $100,000-plus income earners has recovered two-thirds of its total pandemic losses, while the index among lower-income Americans is less than halfway back to its pre-pandemic position. With those shifts, the income gap, 33.6 points, is its widest in a year, returning to more typical levels after uncharacteristically low divisions throughout the pandemic.