For the nation as a whole, median household income decreased by 1.1 percent to $42,409 in 2002. Median incomes were higher for white and Asian households but declined for every other ethnic group.

The poverty line is established by a decades-old formula that essentially determines the annual cost of providing minimally adequate nutrition for various family sizes and multiples that number by three. The formula takes no account of inflation in other areas of family life, such as housing. The poverty rate for a family of four in 2002 was $18,392. A single person is considered poor at $9,183.

Within the unfortunate overall increase there are a number of disturbing trends regarding particular groups. For example, poverty increased nearly 6 percent among families, although the family rate, at 9.6 percent , is still lower than that of the population as a whole. The number of people living in severe poverty (50 percent or less of the poverty line) rose by over 5 percent . The poverty rate for African-Americans grew by over 6 percent in 2002, to 24.1 percent , while those for whites (8 percent ), Asians (10 percent ), Hispanics (21.8 percent ), and people over 65 (10.4 percent ) were nearly unchanged. The rates for children under 18 (16.7 percent ), and especially those under age 5, grew significantly. Poverty among those aged 18 to 64 rose by 5 percent (to 10.6 percent ), reflecting high unemployment and decreasing wages in the labor force. The poverty rate was essentially unchanged in every region except the Midwest, where it rose by nearly 10 percent , because of loss of manufacturing jobs.

The findings are particularly disturbing, given the stagnant economy and congressional failure to increase funding for low-income programs that could help some people escape poverty. For example, efforts to increase the minimum wage for the first time in six years have failed repeatedly. The Senate has not acted to reauthorize the nation’s welfare program, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), although it expired last year (it has been funded by temporary extensions of current law through March 2004). No job creation initiatives are before Congress, and funding for many programs that are key to the survival of low-income families has been frozen or cut.

The increase in poverty among people aged 18 to 64 reveals one of the great weaknesses in the current economy. One-fifth of all U.S. workers in 2001 earned between $10,000 and $20,000 in 2001, placing most of them below the poverty line, despite full-time employment.

According to the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid, one-third of these workers and their families had no health coverage through either government programs or employer-provided insurance. Even those who had access to Medicaid were and are faced with rising co-payments imposed by their states as government budgets tighten, and many states have frozen enrollment in the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Clearly part of the increase in poverty and the decline in income and benefits available to workers and low-income people is the result of a stagnant and deteriorated economy. Recent signs of a weak improvement in the economy, however, offer little reason for hope in the lives of those at the bottom of the income ladder. In many cases, Congress has failed to act on programs that would help households living in poverty. In others, it has actually reduced benefits for those in need.

TANF and child care: For example, despite the fact that the authorization expired in 2002 for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF, the national welfare program for extremely poor families with children), Congress has been unable to agree on how the program should be revised and reauthorized. A series of continuing resolutions has kept the current TANF in operation while Congress debates whether to increase work requirements in an economy that clearly cannot create enough jobs for its potential labor force or whether to refocus the program to concentrate on marriage promotion.

The Bush Administration has requested and the House has approved a major increase in the amount of work a family must do in order to qualify for welfare benefits, but has failed to increase funding for child care for these families and has provided no job training and educational funds. The Senate seeks a smaller work requirement but is hung up on the size of increase in child care funding, without which it will not reauthorize TANF. Welfare rolls have begun to rise in most parts of the country with the result that many states now need all of their TANF funds for cash benefits and have reduced the amount they spend on child care. Several of them now give subsidies only to families leaving TANF, not to all low-income households with child care needs.

Earned income tax credit (EITC): The EITC was enacted to help low-income workers with children protect most of their earnings from the cost of taxes, especially the regressive Social Security tax, which takes the first 7.65 percent from even the lowest wages. Most of the benefit from EITC goes to working families earning under $20,000. Nonetheless, the Internal Revenue Service, fearing possible fraud in the program, seeks increased funding for rules enforcement and has proposed to require families benefiting from the EITC to do greatly increased paperwork before they qualify, including proving that the children they claim actually live with them.

Minimum wage: The minimum wage has been frozen at $5.15 per hour since it was last increased in 1997. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) has proposed raising it by 75 cents an hour six months after approval of his legislation and another 75 cents a year later. Various versions of this proposal have been before Congress for four years, but they have failed repeatedly to come to a vote. Twelve states have enacted minimum wages higher than the federal level, some going up to $10 an hour. A single person earning minimum wage, working 40 hours a week for 52 weeks a year, would earn $10,712. For a person with a dependent, this is below the poverty line.

General Assembly: The prevalence of poverty in the U.S. has captured the abiding concern of the General Assemblies, which have emphasized the obligation of the church to minister to people of all economic classes (PCUSA, 1956, p. 232), and to repudiate “… all assumptions and attitudes that confuse ‘respectability’ with righteousness…” (UPCUSA, 1965, p. 391). The Assemblies have also been concerned about this alleviation of poverty, what the 1965 PCUS Assembly called “… a powerful accessory to our social ills…” (PCUS, 1965, p. 162). This concern has led Assemblies to propose a guaranteed minimum income (UPCUSA, 1968, p. 386; PCUS, 1971, p. 146), to urge special efforts to deal with unemployment, including guaranteeing employment (UPCUSA, 1968, p. 645; PCUS, 1976, p. 87; PCUS, 1977, p. 183), to support the designation of high unemployment areas as disaster areas, and to support programs targeted toward the needs of women, infants and children, and the hungry (UPCUSA, 1976, p. 503; PCUS, 1977, p. 184).