Census: Median household income rose previous year in Clark County

Plus, nearly every demographic group experienced a rise in incomes last year, according to the Census, thanks to more Americans securing full-time and better-paying jobs – a total year-over-year rise of about 2.2 million workers.

Mayor Mike Duggan, who is running for reelection, was optimistic about the news.

“It’s good to see us heading in the right direction”, Flax Wilt said.

Duggan cited partnerships with major employers, job training programs and expanded bus service that helps people get to jobs.

That’s the highest median income ever recorded, though the Census Bureau cautions the changes they’ve made in their survey make historical comparisons very hard.

However, according to Renwick, the Census Bureau cautions against making comparisons to income figures from before 2014 due to a change in how the data were collected.

YDSTIE: Well, as you said, the median household income – that’s the yearly income of households right in the middle of the income ladder – it rose significantly to $59,039 in 2016.

Real income grew drastically more for the top 10 percent of Americans than for the bottom 90 percent. Polun is concerned about the effect of the state budget on poverty.

The Supplemental Poverty Measure extends that analysis to include information on people and families who receive government assistance. The poverty rate fell previous year to 12.7 per cent from 13.5 per cent, Census said. Only 6.9 percent of the state’s residents live below the poverty line, compared with a national average of 13.7 percent (in MS almost 21 percent of people live in poverty).

In Michigan, Detroit, Westland and Shelby Township were the only large communities that saw a drop in overall poverty rates.

Among racial and ethnic groups, African-Americans and Hispanics both registered poverty rates above the national average.

An estimated 15,979 county residents – just over 14 percent of the total population – were living in poverty, down from an estimated 15.2 percent the year before.

For poverty, bureau said the rates were comparable.

“From what we are seeing, there are still a lot of people struggling below the ALICE threshold”, said Stephanie Hoopes, director of the ALICE Project. Again, with wage growth relatively weak, rising employment was primarily responsible for such a large jump in household income.

The percentage of people without health insurance was 8.8%, a decline of 0.3%. Among states that did not expand Medicaid, the rate is 11.7 percent. Finally, there was also data today on health insurance coverage. Last year, 6.4 percent of non-Hispanic whites were living below the poverty limit, compared with 18.6 percent of Hispanics and 17.4 percent of blacks. Additional brushstrokes added a historically high number of seniors, children staying at home longer and more generations than ever living under Canadian roofs, among other flourishes. Looking at poverty patterns in the US from the early 1960s to 2016, the researchers found contradictory results to studies that have shown little improvement in poverty over time or that antipoverty measures have been ineffective.