US poverty numbers grow for fourth year

WASHINGTON - Poverty in the United States rose last year for the fourth year in a row, driven by an increase in poor whites, while the median income for Americans remained roughly flat.

The Census Bureau's annual poverty report found the percentage of Americans living in poverty rose to 12.7 per cent from 12.5 per cent in 2003, as 1.1 million more people slipped into poverty last year.

The ranks of the poor rose to 37 million from 35.9 million.

The Bush Administration called the 2004 increase "modest". The rise was not surprising as poverty rates typically lagged improvements in employment and the economy in general, said Elizabeth Anderson, of the Commerce Department's economics and statistics administration.

"What's happening ... is kind of similar to what happened in the early 1990s where you have a recession officially over and then several more years after that a rise in poverty," said Charles Nelson, a bureau assistant division chief in the bureau's housing and household economic statistics Division.

Some economists said the data was worse than expected.

"The economy looks pretty snappy from 30,000 feet, but when you get down and look at how actual working families are doing, they're falling behind year after year," said Jared Bernstein, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute.

"The main reason for that appears to be the fact that the job market has yet to generate the kind of increases in living standards you'd expect at this point."

The average poverty threshold in the US for a family of four is an income of US$19,307 ($28,350). It is US$15,067 for a family of three, US$12,334 for a family of two and US$9645 for individuals.

Non-Hispanic whites saw their poverty rate hit 8.6 per cent for 2004, compared with 8.2 per cent in 2003. The rate fell for Asians and remained unchanged for blacks and Hispanics.

The Midwest was the only region where income declined, down 2.8 per cent to US$44,657.

The bureau said people with health insurance coverage rose, but so did the number without it, leaving the percentage of the US population without health insurance coverage unchanged at 15.7 per cent in 2004.

Government health insurance programmes covered a higher percentage of people in 2004 than the previous year, while employment-based health insurance covered a smaller percentage of people.

"Public programmes such as Medicaid and SCHIP [State Children's Health Insurance Programme] are the healthcare safety net for millions of Americans," said Kathleen Stoll, health policy director of Families USA, a liberal-leaning health care policy group.

- REUTERS