Sept 10 (Askume) – Inflation-adjusted household income rose last year but the poverty rate was only slightly changed, the U.S. Census Bureau reported on Tuesday, a sign of how well-off American families are ahead of the mixed economic recovery that has hit the post-coronavirus pandemic highs, with job growth accelerating, inflation slowing.
Real median household income will rise to $80,610 in 2023, up 4.0% from 2022 and peaking in 2019, while overall worker incomes are several years later than they were before the pandemic.
But the report also shows that the country’s main measure of poverty, adjusted for government support such as food aid, tax credits and household spending, will rise to 12.9% from 12.4% in 2022. The so-called official poverty rate fell to 11.1% from 11.5%.
However, the Census notes that the 2023 supplemental measure makes more adjustments to income levels to determine whether someone is living in poverty than the official measure. If the increase in the official threshold on the supplemental tax rate is applied, the rate will fall to 12.0% from 12.4% last year.
In 2023, the official tax rate threshold for a family of two adults and two children will increase by 4.1% to $30,900.
The adjusted supplemental child poverty rate, which refers to children under 18 years of age, increased from 12.4% last year to 13.7% in 2023. The increase in the supplemental child poverty rate has been affected by the expiration of additional government benefits related to the pandemic. For example, in March last year, most states in the United States ended additional food assistance programs related to the pandemic, and school meal assistance was also reduced.
The 2023 income and poverty data were released two months before the US presidential election. A key question is how much inflation will hit voters’ wallets after the pandemic hit in early 2020 and government aid programs designed to boost household incomes ended.
Economic growth was stronger than expected last year and returned to pre-pandemic levels, while the unemployment rate was 3.4% in January 2023, lower than before the health shock. Although it had risen to 3.7% by December last year, it was still the lowest level in more than 50 years.
More workers
Through 2023, job growth will create an average of about 250,000 new nonfarm jobs per month, up from an average of 183,000 in the decade before the pandemic.
The report’s findings also show the same thing. Liana Fox, assistant director of the Department of Economic Characteristics, Social, Economic and Housing Statistics, said that by 2023, there will be more than 2.1 million full-time workers throughout the year, and labor income will become the main driver of household income. . “We are seeing people working more.”
The worst inflation in more than four decades is causing trouble for households and the Federal Reserve. The central bank raised interest rates above 5% in the middle of last year and has maintained them at that level, trying to bring price growth back to the normal annual trend of 2%.
Inflation has fallen from a high of 7.1% annual growth in June 2022 to 5.5% in early 2023 and more than halved to 2.6% by December, according to the central bank’s preferred measure. The current inflation rate is 2.5%.
The Census report says that household income has increased across the income distribution.
Between 2022 and 2023, the real median household income of white families will increase by 5.4%, and the real median household income of non-Latino white families will increase by 5.7%. There is no significant change in the median income of Black, Asian and Hispanic families, the bureau said.
However, the ratio of women’s earnings to men’s earnings fell for the first time since 2003, as women’s earnings grew faster than men’s. Real median earnings for men working full time rose 3.0% over the year, while median earnings for women with similar working patterns rose 1.5%. Census officials said this may be due to an increase in the number of Hispanic women in the labor force last year because they earn less.
The report also shows that 92.0% of Americans will have health insurance for at least part of 2023, a number that is nearly unchanged from last year.
