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Policymakers Must Work to Ensure that All Californians Share in the State’s Economic Gains

New Census figures released today show rising income inequality across the state and millions of California residents who are struggling to get by on extremely low incomes, while higher-income households experienced more income growth. Even as the latest figures also show there is a decline in the official poverty rate in California, these findings underscore the need for policymakers to ensure that the benefits of California’s strong economy and recent economic growth are shared among all Californians.

The latest Census figures indicate that median household income in California grew to $75,277 in 2018, an increase of 2.3% over the prior year after adjusting for inflation. Median annual earnings for all workers also increased by 0.9% compared to inflation-adjusted earnings in 2017, and a smaller share of Californians were unemployed. These modest economic gains for typical households and workers are encouraging, but must be considered within the broader context of rising inequality within the state over the past several years. From 2006 to 2018, the median household income in California increased by 6.4%, after adjusting for inflation, but the average real income for the lowest quintile of households (those in the bottom 20%) actually decreased by 5.3% – while the inflation-adjusted average income for the top 5% of households increased by 18.6%, or nearly three times as much as the increase in the median income (see Figure 1). At the same time, the cost of living – particularly the cost of housing – has increased much faster than wages for typical workers, as noted in the Budget Center’s report on Supplemental Poverty Measure data released earlier this month. As a result, many Californians with middle and low incomes find themselves unable to make ends meet.

Also troubling are new data from the Census Bureau that show that millions of people in California continue to struggle to get by on the extremely low incomes reflected in the official federal poverty line. There is slight progress to be noted: California’s official poverty rate of 12.8% for 2018 was lower compared to the previous year, when it was 13.3%. The state’s official child poverty rate also dropped to 17.4% in 2018, from a rate of 18.1% in 2017. However, 4.9 million Californians, including 1.5 million children, still lived in poverty in 2018 based on the official poverty measure. For a family of two adults and two children, for example, this means living on an annual cash income of less than $25,465. Moreover, the state’s poverty rate under the official poverty measure still has not dropped to its pre-Great Recession levels (see Figure 2). The child poverty rate in 2018 is not statistically different from the pre-recession rate.

Also troubling, 2.2 million individuals, including 660,000 children, lived in deep poverty in 2018 based on the official poverty measure, meaning that their families had cash incomes of less than half of the official poverty threshold last year, or less than $12,732 for a two-parent family with two children to pay for basic needs. The state’s deep poverty rates were 5.9% overall and 7.5% for children in 2018.

The latest Census figures also reveal stark differences in people’s economic well-being across California’s counties. In 2018, the official poverty rate ranged from a low of 6.0% to a high of 23.1% across the counties, while the official child poverty rate ranged from 3.9% to 32.2%. In eight counties, more than 1 in 5 people lived in poverty, largely in the Central Valley (see Figure 3). Additionally, more than 1 in 5 children lived in poverty in 16 counties, and this includes four counties – again, mostly in the Central Valley – where over 30% of children were in poverty (see link to downloadable data).

Download map data.

Although these Census figures published today show that poverty remains unacceptably high in California, they understate the problem of economic hardship in many parts of the state because they reflect an outdated measure of poverty. Census figures released earlier this month based on an improved measure – the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), which accounts for the high cost of housing in many parts of the state – show that roughly 7.1 million Californians per year, more than 1 in 6 state residents (18.1%), could not adequately support themselves and their families between 2016 and 2018. This rate is much higher than the official poverty rate measured over the same time frame in the same data of 12.5% (see Figure 4). Under this more accurate measure of hardship, California continues to have the highest poverty rate and by far the most residents in poverty of the 50 states. (See the Budget Center’s guide to poverty measures for California for more details on the differences between the official and supplemental measures.)

The new Census poverty figures underscore the need for policymakers to do more to ensure that all people can share in our state’s economic progress. Some encouraging recent investments in the 2019-20 state budget include an expanded CalEITC – a refundable state tax credit targeted to low-earning workers – and improvements to the CalWORKs program, which provides modest cash assistance for low-income children and their families.  These investments represent important opportunities to help Californians avoid and overcome poverty and address the serious negative consequences of living in poverty.

Other specific steps that policymakers can take include:

• Make sure workers earn enough to support themselves and their families. Most families in poverty work, which means that decades of wage stagnation have been a key barrier to economic security and opportunity, as noted in the Budget Center’s recent Labor Day report. In recent years, lawmakers have taken steps to address this challenge, such as raising the state’s minimum wage and establishing and subsequently expanding the CalEITC. Policymakers could build on these important investments by extending the CalEITC to workers who remain excluded (such as those filing taxes with an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number). Greater investments in career pathways, career technical education, and adult education could also help some individuals advance and prepare for jobs in high-demand, better-paying industries. Additionally, women and workers of color, particularly black and Latinx workers, experience some of the greatest disadvantages and discrimination in the job market. Given this, lawmakers should prioritize policies that reduce persistent disparities in pay and access to workplace benefits by race, ethnicity, and gender.

• Help families afford their basic needs. With the rising cost of basic expenses, particularly housing, boosting earnings is not enough to increase economic security. With housing costs far outpacing many families’ earnings in recent years, it has become increasingly challenging for people with low incomes to keep a roof over their heads. Over half of California renters are housing cost-burdened, meaning that they pay more than 30 percent of their income toward housing, and nearly a third spend more than half of their income on housing. Since housing costs are most families’ biggest basic expense, addressing the housing affordability crisis is key to broadening economic security in California. Policymakers should also continue to invest in affordable child care, another major basic expense for many working families.

• Reject harsh changes to public supports that help families make ends meet and get ahead. Public supports such as food assistance through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) (CalFresh in California) provide vital resources to help Californians make ends meet now. They also help children in poverty succeed over the long term, according to research. Yet the Trump Administration has proposed changes to SNAP rules that would reduce the number of individuals able to access this support. People in communities throughout the state would likely be harmed. The Administration has also announced a change to the rule directing how receipt of public supports can affect whether immigrants can become permanent residents in the US, threatening harm for thousands of families working to build a better future for themselves and our state of immigrants.

This report was updated on October 10, 2019, due to revised SPM data from the US Census Bureau. 

Policymakers Have Opportunity to Promote Economic Security, Break Down Barriers

Approximately 7.1 million Californians lived in poverty each year from 2016 to 2018 – more than 1 in 6 state residents (18.1%) – according to new Census data released this morning based on the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM).

The high cost of living in many parts of California is a key reason for California’s high SPM poverty rate, underscoring the continuing need for policies that address the state’s affordability challenges. High living costs are particularly problematic when they rise faster than incomes. This presents a challenge in California because inflation-adjusted wages in recent decades have grown only for the highest-paid workers, while wages for mid-wage and low-wage workers have remained largely flat, as highlighted in the Budget Center’s recent Labor Day report. Public supports like tax credits, public health insurance, and food assistance play a critical role in helping families and individuals meet their basic needs as living expenses rise. New national data also released today show that many more individuals would be living in poverty if they did not have access to these vital public supports.

It’s also important to note today’s SPM figures provide a more accurate indicator of economic need in California than the official federal poverty measure that is frequently used. The SPM accounts for the high cost of living in many parts of the state as well as public supports that help families meet basic needs, among other factors. (See more below on how the SPM addresses shortcomings of the official poverty measure.)

Housing Costs Rising Faster Than Wages Are a Barrier for Californians

California’s high SPM poverty rate largely reflects the high housing costs in many parts of California. The SPM accounts for differences in housing costs across the country, unlike the official poverty measure, and when these costs are factored in, a much larger share of the state’s population is shown to be living in poverty: 18.1% under the SPM from 2016 to 2018, compared to 12.5% under the official measure.

Housing affordability is a problem throughout California, even in areas where housing costs are lower, because incomes are also lower in these areas. Statewide, more than half of renter households pay more than 30% of their incomes toward housing, making them housing cost-burdened, and nearly a third are severely cost-burdened, paying more than half of their incomes toward housing. California’s unaffordable housing costs are particularly a problem because they have been growing far faster than earnings for most workers. While inflation-adjusted median household rents increased by 16.1% from 2006 to 2017, median hourly wages for workers ages 25 to 64 actually declined by 0.5%. This decline in hourly wages for most workers is only one component of a broader picture of changes in the labor market – including a decline in employer-sponsored retirement plans, a drop in union representation, and a small but rising share of workers engaged in gig work –  such that many Californians can no longer count on their jobs to provide economic security.

Housing costs in many parts of California are higher than the national average, as reflected in the relatively high poverty thresholds for many metro areas within the state under the SPM. These relatively high housing costs, which are factored into poverty under the SPM, are a key reason that California’s poverty ranking among the 50 states jumps from 18th under the official poverty measure up to first under the SPM, a dubious distinction.

Policies Are Needed to Help Californians’ Incomes Cover Basic Living Expenses

California’s high supplemental poverty rate focuses attention on two key challenges for the state: a high and rising cost of living, paired with stagnant earnings for all but the highest-paid workers. At the same time, the measurable impact of public supports in reducing poverty suggests that smart public investments to help individuals meet basic needs, together with a strong economy, can help more Californians achieve economic security.

State policymakers have taken several important steps in recent years to help address the challenges that residents with low incomes face in making ends meet. These include establishing the CalEITC – a refundable state tax credit targeted to low-earning workers – and subsequently expanding the credit, including adding a new Young Child Tax Credit for families with the youngest children; increasing the support available to families with children through CalWORKs, California’s welfare-to-work program; increasing access to affordable child care and health insurance; and pursuing multiple strategies to address housing affordability, both this year and in prior years. Policymakers have also taken some important steps to address changes in the labor market that have left workers with stalled wages and shrinking access to benefits, through policies such as raising the state’s minimum wage and creating CalSavers, a workplace retirement savings option for private sector employees.

Given that many Californians continue to live without enough resources to cover the costs of basic necessities, it is important to continue to build on the state’s recent investments to address affordability and the changing labor market. Thoughtful public policies can help make basic necessities like housing, child care, and health care more affordable; can help ensure that incomes for all Californians, not just the highest-paid workers, better match the rising cost of living; and can help restore the promise that all California workers get to share in the economic prosperity that they help to create.

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Note About the Census Bureau Data Released Today:

The state-level figures released today reflect average annual supplemental poverty rates during a three-year period, from 2016 to 2018. The SPM addresses a number of shortcomings of the official poverty measure. (See the Budget Center’s Guide to Understanding Poverty Measures for more details on the differences between these poverty measures.) For one, under the official measure, the income threshold for determining who lives in poverty is the same in all parts of the US. For example, a single parent with two children was considered to be living in poverty in 2018 if their annual income was below $20,231, regardless of whether they lived in a low-cost place like rural Mississippi or a high-cost place like San Francisco. The SPM better accounts for differences in the cost of living by adjusting the poverty threshold to reflect differences in the cost of housing throughout the US. For example, the SPM poverty line for a single parent with two children living in a renter household in San Francisco was $32,667 in 2018 – more than 60% higher than the poverty line based on the official measure.

Another shortcoming of the official poverty measure is that it fails to factor in the broad array of resources that families use to pay for basic expenses. The official measure only counts cash income sources, such as earnings from work, Social Security payments, and cash assistance from welfare-to-work programs. It does not take into account noncash resources, such as food or housing assistance, and it fails to consider how tax benefits, such as the federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), increase people’s economic well-being. The SPM improves on the official measure by including these resources. It also better accounts for the resources people actually have available to spend by subtracting from their incomes what is needed to pay for necessary expenses, including work-related expenses, such as child care; medical expenses, such as health insurance premiums and out-of-pocket costs; and state and federal income and payroll taxes.

After incorporating these improvements over the official poverty measure, the SPM produces a more realistic picture of poverty in California: the state’s SPM poverty rate that was nearly 1.5 times the official poverty rate between 2016 and 2018 (18.1% versus 12.5%, respectively).

Although the SPM provides a more accurate picture of economic hardship in California, it does not indicate how much people need to earn to achieve a basic standard of living. Measures of what it actually takes to make ends meet in California show that families need incomes several times higher than the official poverty line to afford basic necessities.

Executive Summary

This Guide to Understanding Poverty Measures Used to Assess Economic Well-Being in California is designed to help policy stakeholders understand the details of and differences between the three major measures of poverty available for California — the official poverty measure, the Supplemental Poverty Measure, and the California Poverty Measure — and provides guidance on when each measure is most appropriate to use to understand the poverty Californians experience.

The first section of the guide provides a brief history of the three poverty measures and describes how each one determines a family’s or individual’s poverty status. The second section explains which data sources the measures are based on and discusses how to find and use the data for each one. The final section of this guide outlines the major advantages and limitations of each measure and provides guidance on when to use one measure over another. Tables, figures, and additional downloadable resources (listed below) provide supplementary information.

Download the Guide to Understanding Poverty Measures Used to Assess Economic Well-Being in California.

Related Downloadable Resources

• Quick Guide to Using Different Poverty Measures for California
• Summary of Differences in How Poverty Status Is Calculated Under Different Poverty Measures for California
• Comparison of Official, Supplemental, and California Poverty Measure Thresholds, 2017 (excel file)
• Webinar and Slide Deck: Understanding Poverty Measures Used to Assess Economic Well-Being in California