By the Numbers: Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage 2012

Posted September 17, 2013 at 11:54 am by Lawrence Mishel and Elise Gould

Key numbers from today’s new Census report, Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2012.

Income

$7,490 (-11.6%)
The decline in median non-elderly household income from 2000 to 2012 in level terms and percentage terms, respectively
$51,668 vs. $49,398
Median earnings for a man working full time, full year in 1973 and 2012, respectively
$29,261 vs. $37,791
Median earnings for a female working full time, full year in 1973 and 2012, respectively
-5.2% vs. -0.8%
The decline over the last decade in median earnings for full time, full year workers age 25 or more with a college degree, men and women, respectively
0.6% ($1,846)
Income gains for top 5 percent over 2009-12, only income group with improvement
$3,822 (-6.3%)
The decline in median white, non-Hispanic household income from 2000 to 2012 in level terms and percentage terms, respectively
$5,838 (-14.8%)
The decline in median African-American household income from 2000 to 2012 in level terms and percentage terms, respectively
$5,219 (-11.8%)
The decline in median Hispanic household income from 2000 to 2012 in level terms and percentage terms, respectively

15.0%
The share of the population in poverty in 2012
21.8%
The percent of children under 18 in poverty
46.5 million
The number of people in poverty in 2012
$23,283
The poverty threshold for a family of four with two children
43.9%
The share of the poor population in “deep poverty,” or below half the poverty link
15.3 million
The increase in the number of people aged 65 and older who would be in poverty if Social Security payments were excluded from money income, close to quadrupling the number of elderly people in poverty in 2012
1.7 million
The number of people unemployment insurance kept out of poverty in 2012
4 million
How many fewer people would be in poverty if food stamps (SNAP) were added to money income in 2012

47.3 million
The number of people under 65 without any health insurance in 2012, down from 47.9 million in 2011
13.7 million
The decline in the number of people under 65 with employer-sponsored health insurance from 2000–2012
10.8 percentage points
The decline in the share of the under 65 population with employer-sponsored health insurance from 2000-2012
25.4 million
The increase in the number of people under 65 on government insurance (e.g., Medicare, Medicaid) from 2000 to 2012; government insurance accounts for the increase in overall coverage from 2011 to 2012, an increase of 379,000 over the year
0.5 percent
The increase in employer-sponsored health insurance among 19-25 year olds, 2009 to 2012, the only group which saw this rate increase as their employment-to-populations ratio fell the most—almost surely due to the ACA provision to allow young adults to secure coverage through their parents’ employer-sponsored insurance policies