The latest income, poverty and health insurance report from the U.S. Census Bureau shows people across the nation are facing increasing poverty rates and more than 27 million people remain uninsured.
The report shows:
- Real median household income decreased by 2.3%
- Supplemental poverty rate increased by 4.6%
- Rate of people with health insurance increased by 0.4%
Fred Floss, economic and finance professor at SUNY Buffalo State, said this data shows a disconnect between the well-being of Americans and the well-being of the overall economy.
“Our economy is doing strong,” Floss said. “But people aren’t feeling it. And the reason they’re not feeling it, particularly if you are in the middle income or in the lower income, is because we used to be getting from the government this earned income tax credit.”
In upstate New York, poverty rates are between 20-30% per capita based on data from July 2022.
- Buffalo: 27.6%
- Rochester: 29.3%
- Syracuse: 30.1%
- Albany: 21.7%
- NYC: 17.1%
Floss said with millions of people without health insurance coverage, that can put a strain on workers nationwide.
“The important part about that is that the people who don’t have health care end up in our emergency rooms, end up being much sicker. And then we as the American people have to take care of them and that just raises the cost of health insurance for everyone,” Floss said.
“The question we need to ask as a society: would it be better for us all to raise our taxes a little bit and make sure that everybody’s taken care of? Or are we going to do what we do now, which is reach into our pockets and give money to charity and decide which charities we want to give our money to?”