New Census Data Show Many in Middle Class Are ‘Near Poor’
When the U.S. Census Bureau retooled its formula for determining the number of poor people living in the United States, the number the bureau estimated to be living in poverty shot up from 46.1 million to 49.1 million. Now that reformulation is shining a light on the vast numbers of people who appear to be middle class but who actually fall into a category called the “near poor.”
The new numbers reveal a grim portrait of Americans living paycheck to paycheck, often without access to health care, many behind the middle-class exterior of a suburban home. According to the new data, some 51 million Americans receive incomes that are just 50 percent higher than the official poverty line—a figure that is 76 percent higher than the previous measure, according to The New York Times, which reports:
More Older Americans Slipping Into Poverty
When the U.S. Census Bureau updated its model for calculating the nation’s poverty rate, it arrived at an unexpected result: nearly twice as many older Americans qualify as poor than had been previously thought. The new data suggest that 16 percent of those 65 and older are poor. Under the old formula, which failed to accurately reflect housing and medical costs, the poverty rate for older Americans stood at 9 percent.
The Los Angeles Times reports:
[M]edical costs are pushing low-income seniors living on fixed incomes over the brink, said Kathleen S. Short, a U.S. Census Bureau economist.
For many, that fixed income amounts to Social Security benefits and not much else, due to the declining numbers of Americans who have a traditional pension.
As Go Unions, So Goes the Middle Class
This is a cross-post from the Campaign for American Progress. David Madland and Nick Bunker parse the latest figures to show states with weak unions also share another trait—a weak middle class.
New state income data released yesterday by the U.S. Census Bureau shows the importance of unions to boosting incomes for all middle-class households—union and nonunion alike. The 2010 income data makes it clear that strong unions are a critical factor in creating a middle-class society. Restoring the strength of unions would go a long way toward rebuilding the middle class.
The states with the lowest percentage of workers in unions—North Carolina, Georgia, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Oklahoma and Texas—all have relatively weak middle classes. In each of these states, the share of income going to the middle class (the middle 60 percent of the population by income) is below the national average, according to Census Bureau figures.
Median Income Down, Poverty Up
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More troubling news on the downward economic spiral of America’s working families. In 2010, median household income declined and the poverty rate increased, according to U.S. Census Bureau data announced this morning.
Running counter to the American tradition of ever-rising prosperity, real median household income in the United States declined by 2.3 percent from 2009 to 2010 and now stands at $49,445. Further:
The nation’s official poverty rate in 2010 was 15.1 percent, up from 14.3 percent in 2009—the third consecutive annual increase in the poverty rate. There were 46.2 million people in poverty in 2010, up from 43.6 million in 2009—the fourth consecutive annual increase and the largest number in the 52 years for which poverty estimates have been published.
Behind the bad data are two factors, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). First, the unemployment rate increased from 9.3 percent in 2009 to 9.6 percent in 2010. Second, long-term unemployment, or the percent unemployed 27 weeks or more, grew from 31.2 percent in 2009 to 43.3 percent in 2010.
More Poverty, Lower Wages, Shrinking Health Care. The USA Today
New data out from the U.S. Census Bureau yesterday show a nation on the decline: Millions more Americans are in poverty and hundreds of thousands more are without health insurance compared with a year ago—and our median household income is now the lowest since 1997.
As Time’s Justin Fox puts it:
I don’t know how much of this was bad luck and how much was bad policy (nobody does), but there’s really no getting around the fact that the Bush presidency was an economic debacle. Americans got poorer on his watch.
