The Census Bureau’s annual data-release of income, poverty, and health coverage statistics offers important insight into the economic circumstances of children and families in the previous year. The aggregate data released last week paints a picture of relative stability, with no significant changes to median income, poverty, and health insurance coverage rates between 2023 and 2024. But a closer look at the disaggregated data raises deep concerns about the impact of administrative actions and policy decisions that cause individuals and families to lose access to programs that meet their basic needs, and are a harbinger of the much deeper hardship to come as states prepare to implement the new paperwork requirements and cuts to food assistance and health coverage enacted in the recent budget law.
According to Census Bureau data, in 2024:
- Overall median income was $83,730, keeping pace with inflation.
- The poverty rate as measured by the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) also held steady, with 12.9 percent of all people and 13.4 percent of children living with income and resources below the poverty thresholds. The SPM is a more helpful measure of families’ economic circumstances than the Official Poverty Measure (OPM) because it takes into account the impact of public investments. While the OPM only considers cash benefits and income among families’ resources, the SPM counts non-cash benefits such as food and housing assistance as well as refundable tax credits among families’ resources, while also subtracting certain expenses that limit their spending power. In 2024, the SPM poverty threshold was $39,430 for a two-adult, two-child family who rented their housing. Research has consistently shown that families with incomes well above these thresholds experience serious material hardships and struggle to make ends meet. The data indicate that the share of individuals with incomes up to twice the SPM thresholds also held steady between 2023 and 2024, with 28.5 percent of individuals having incomes between 1 and 1.99 times the SPM thresholds in 2024, compared to 28.4 in 2023.
- The share of all people with health coverage also held steady at 92 percent. While there was a .8 percentage point decrease in public coverage between 2023 and 2024, as sates resumed regular eligibility redeterminations in Medicaid following the end of the pandemic’s continuous enrollment policy, there was a.7 percentage point increase in private coverage, primarily through direct purchase or Marketplace coverage as enhanced premium tax credits continued to make Marketplace coverage more affordable for millions of people.