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The US Census Bureau released 2008 income, poverty, and health insurance data in September 2009. Real median household income for the 117.2 million households was $50,303 in 2008, down from $52,590 in 1999. Income for households headed by non-Hispanic whites was $55,530, for Blacks $34,220, for Hispanics $37,900, and for Asians $65,640.

There were 101.6 million households headed by US-born persons and 15.6 million headed by foreign-born persons in 2008. The median income of households headed by US-born persons was $51,100, compared with $43,500 for households headed by foreign-born persons.

There were 84 million men and 75 million women in the labor force in 2008; 71 percent of the men and 59 percent of the women worked full-time and year-round. Women who worked full-time and year-round earned 77 percent as much as men in 2008, a median $35,700 compared to $46,400. In real or inflation-adjusted terms, the median earnings of men have been flat for three decades, while the earnings of women flattened in the past two decades.

Poverty. The share of US residents with incomes below the poverty line rose in 2008 to 13.2 percent, the highest poverty rate since 1997; almost 40 million of the 301 million US residents had incomes below the poverty line. The poor included 17 million non-Hispanic whites; 11 million Hispanics; 9.4 million Blacks; and 1.6 million Asians.

Almost 18 percent of the 36.7 million foreign-born US residents were poor, compared with 12.6 percent of the 264 million US-born residents.

Poverty rates are highest for children? 19 percent were poor in 2008, and a third of all poor people are children. Poverty rates were higher for minority children. Almost 35 percent of Black children and 31 percent of Latino children were poor compared to 11 percent of white children.

About 12.5 percent of metro residents had incomes below the poverty line of $21,027 for two adults and two children in 2007, compared with 15.4 percent on nonmetro residents. The nonmetro poverty rate has been higher than the metro rate since 2001.

Health Insurance. Some 15.4 percent of US residents, about 46.3 million people, did not have health insurance in 2008. About 13 percent of US-born residents did not have health insurance, compared to a third of foreign-born residents.

Food Stamps. The number of US residents receiving Food Stamps surpassed 35 million in June 2009, up over 20 percent from June 2008. The average individual recipient received $133 a month; the average household received $293 a month. In 2004, traditional paper food stamp coupons were replaced with debit cards that processed charges through electronic benefit transfer terminals that cost $1,100 and incur monthly fees.

USDA operates 15 food-assistance programs, but five, including Food Stamps (officially the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP), the National School Lunch Program; the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC); the Child and Adult Care Food Program; and the School Breakfast Program, account for 95 percent of food-assistance spending. (www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/FoodNutritionAssistance/background.htm)

Welfare. California in 2008 had 12 percent of US residents and 31 percent of US cash welfare recipients? some 1.2 million people, including 950,000 children received $5.5 billion in Cal-Works payments. California's $694-a-month grant for a single-parent family of three is second only to New York in the continental US. California is one of 11 states that allows children under 18 to continue receiving cash assistance after their parents' five-year eligibility has expired.

About 48,000 of the 526,000 households enrolled in Cal-Works were headed by unauthorized foreigners. California also does not apply full family sanctions. If a parent fails to work at least 130 hours a month, her $139 monthly payment is eliminated, but the $275 payment per child continues.

Nonmetro Jobs. There were 138.9 million employed US workers in September 2009; over 15 million workers were jobless. The unemployment rate of Hispanic workers, 12.7 percent, was almost 1.5 times that of white workers, nine percent, and the jobless rate of Black workers, 15.4 percent, approached twice that of white workers.

Both metro and nonmetro areas began to lose jobs in 2008. Employment fell by more than 10 percent between the second quarter of 2008 and the second quarter of 2009 in construction and manufacturing in both metro and nonmetro areas. Unemployment rates rose fastest in a north-south corridor extending from the Great Lakes southward; in the south, many of the counties that were attracting foreign-born workers to fill jobs in manufacturing, construction and services saw their unemployment rates increase by more than six percentage points in a year.

Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2008. P60-236RV. www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/poverty08.html