Incomes and Poverty, 2014 No word from the White House on the latest grim economic data.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/incomes-and-poverty-2014-1442445396
American politics among both parties is in a grim temper, and the new estimates of income and poverty for 2014 that the Census Bureau published on Wednesday help explain why. The report is a portrait of economic stagnation.
Real median household income—the exact halfway point of the earnings distribution—was statistically identical to the 2013 median. The $53,657 for 2014 follows two consecutive years of decline in 2011 and 2012 and remains 6.5% lower than the median in 2007. About the only indicator of well being that hasn’t declined in the Obama recovery are measures of income inequality.
These trends would be less worrisome were there more mobility over time, but the Census data suggest that fewer people are moving up the pay ladder compared to earlier periods. Some 57.1% of households were cemented in the same income quintile between 2009 and 2012.
Meanwhile, the official poverty rate of 14.8%—in human terms, some 46.7 million Americans—also didn’t budge for the fourth straight year and is still 2.3 percentage points higher than in 2007. The most notable finding of 2014 is that poverty increased among groups that are traditionally less vulnerable: married couples with children and people ages 25 and older with at least an undergraduate college degree. From 2009 to 2012, 34.5% of the population had a spell below the poverty line for two months or more.
The White House didn’t put out an official statement on the Census release, and perhaps commenting was too embarrassing politically. No President has done worse by the middle class in modern times. Absent a change of policy direction—prioritizing growth rather than social justice, measuring success by results instead of federal dollars spent—the unfortunate reality is that the future is unlikely to be better than today. No wonder so many Americans are anxious or angry.
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