Bankruptcy

U.S. Poverty Up, Income Down from 2007

By Chris Kramer

In a press release early this month, the U.S. Census Bureau reported statistics on income, poverty and health insurance in the United States. For the most part, the numbers are not especially surprising, considering the current recession. Here?s what the Bureau reported.

Income Levels

Income levels were reported as decreasing year-over-year in all demographics. The breakdown of income change by race and ethnic origin in American households:

• Non-Hispanic white households: Decline of 2.6%, to $55,530 (reported as statistically significant)
• Black households: Decline of 2.8%, to $34,218 (reported as not statistically significant)
• Asian households: Decline of 4.4%, to $65,637 (reported as not statistically significant)
• Hispanic households: Decline of 5.6%, to $37,913 (reported as statistically significant)

The difference between men?s and women?s earnings has also changed since 2007: women who work full time, year-round in 2008 reportedly earned only 77% of what their male counterparts do, down from 78% in 2007.

Poverty Levels

For the first time since 2004, the poverty rate in the United States increased in 2008 at a statistically significant level. The poverty rate of 13.2 percent is apparently the highest in the country since 1997.

• The family poverty rate in 2008 was 10.3% (up from 9.8% in 2007), with 8.1 million families living in poverty (up from 7.6 million).
• The married-couple poverty rate increased to 5.5% (up from 4.9% a year before) and 3.3 million people (up from 2.8 million).
• Racially and by ethnic origin, poverty levels increased in all demographics except blacks, for whom the poverty rate remained unchanged statistically.

Health Insurance Coverage

While the number of uninsured Americans rose from 2007 to 2008, the percentage of the total population without health coverage remained at 15.4%.

• In 2008, 46.3 million Americans were without health insurance (up from 45.7 million in 2007).
• 255.1 million Americans did have health insurance in 2008 (up from 253.4 million in 2007).
• Private health coverage dipped in 2008 from 202.0 million to 201.0 million.
• 87.4 million were covered by government health insurance, up from 83.0 million a year before.

The growing rate of uninsured and government-insured Americans is a major concern cited by proponents for health care reform, as well as the rate of Americans filing bankruptcy due to unmanageable health care costs.

Additional Resources

Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2008 (PDF)

Full post as published by The Bankruptcy Blog on September 21, 2009 (boomark / email).