September 25, 2001
Washington is only state outside the South to see drop in household incomes
Even before the latest round of terrorism-related layoff announcements, cutbacks in Boeing employment had contributed to a significant drop in average family incomes in Washington state, according to a University of Washington analysis.
The U.S. Census Bureau released figures today showing that Washington is one of only three states — Louisiana and Alabama are the others — in which household income has fallen over the past two years.
“Reduced manufacturing employment appears to be behind the drop in median income,” said Christopher Haugen, a policy analyst with the Northwest Policy Center, part of the UW’s Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs.
Boeing employment in the state has fallen to 78,000 this year, from a 1997 peak of 98,000. The income figures are taken from a Census Bureau survey taken in March.
Households in the state lost 8.2 percent of their income, adjusted for inflation, over the two-year period, to wind up at $44,598, the Census Bureau reported.
An accompanying report by the Census Bureau showed that the percentage of Washington state residents living in poverty remained essentially steady over the two-year period, rising only 0.4 percent, to represent 9.6 percent of the population. The poverty threshold for a family of four in 2000 was $17,603 in annual income.
“The decline in median income has not been fueled by increased poverty,” Haugen said. “It appears that middle-income families were not doing as well as we thought.”
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For more information, contact Haugen at (206) 633-1055, npcbox@u.washington.edu.
The census release on household income: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income00.html
The census release on poverty: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty00.html
A UW paper analyzing the data will be posted later today at http://depts.washington.edu/npc
