Really interesting. Anyone else quite surprised by the 2.7 percent number? Having trouble untangling my thoughts about the report. The data of that time period is skewed by the financial crash, probably. But skewed how? What's the number going to look like for 2012 to 2016? I guess we've already got SIPP info for most of those years. I want to go looking but I'm falling behind at work because I'm reading a census report, which just sounds ridiculous when I type it.
Further reflection makes me think that it isn't so surprising that the number is so low, and this is not so much the good news that I thought. To qualify, you have to have 48 consecutive months of very low income. I can imagine a lot of people who are dirt-scraping poor who would catch a break now and then and exceed the cutoff for at least one month. Anyone who works in retail is going to get a boost every November and December when it's all hands on deck for the holiday shopping season. Same for delivery and warehouse workers. Agricultural work is highly seasonal. These sectors represent a very large segment of the workforce. Anyone who drifts from job to job could have some gravy months that allow them to catch up on rent and bills and IOUs, barely scraping by yet excluded from the Census Utterly Destitute list.
And, of course, income doesn't mean a whole lot by itself. You can have 48 great months in a row and still not keep up with interest on your debt. This is how many 100k folks feel, though on a case-by-case basis I would be tempted to laugh at them.
I was completely surprised. I would have guessed 10%, and would have believed 15%. What happened to the permanent underclass? What's more, this is the 48-consecutive-month poverty measure. A survey over ten years would necessarily reduce the 2.7 number, though it's hard to imagine how it could get much smaller.Anyone else quite surprised by the 2.7 percent number?
This is not to say that the U.S., along with other advanced economies, does not struggle with issues of income inequality and poverty. But given the much higher standard of living in the U.S., what is considered poor here is a level of income still not available to most people globally.