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wasoxygen  ·  2957 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Everyone in America is More Broke Than You Think - What About You, Hubski?

Yeah, I think I got this point exactly backwards. When you have more household members, you need more income to get by and stay under [edit: over, duh] the higher poverty line. This reflects the pattern that "additional household members" are usually children, and when they grow up and start earning their own income they usually move to their own household.

Children are frigging expensive. I've seen "total cost of ownership" numbers estimated, including higher education, and it ends up sounding like "have kids or retire 20-30 years early."

This article, and the one I mentioned in response, focus on household income, not well-being, so the children are left out of the picture. But I don't think this changes the explanation of the gap.