• Pre-tax incomes fell for middle-income families of every type between 2000 and 2003. Driven by a recession-induced fall-off in wage income, pre-tax incomes fell by $2,119, or 3.1%, for married-couple families with children; single mothers lost $686 in pre-tax income, or 3.0%; elderly couples lost $353, or 1.0%; and young singles lost $818, or 3.4%.
• After taking into account changes in both pre-tax income and taxes, the finding remains that most middle-income families lost ground between 2000 and 2003. Incomes declined slightly over this period (by 0.2%) for married couples with children and by 1.4% for elderly couples and young singles. Single-mother families saw after-tax income gains of 1.9% because of the greater refundability of child tax credits.
• Family spending on higher insurance co-pays, deductibles, and premiums has escalated in recent years. Middle-income families saw their incomes erode between 2000 and 2003, after changes in both taxes and health spending are taken into account. For married-couple families with children, health spending rose three times faster than income (not inflation-adjusted) between 2000 and 2003, absorbing half the growth of their income. The post-tax, post-health-spending income of married-couple families with children, for instance, fell $699, or 1.3%, between 2000 and 2003, while that of single-mother families fell $433, or 2.0%.
The Policy Shop is the blog of the Oklahoma Institute for Social Policy. This blog provides timely news and information and provides a forum for the free and open exchange of ideas about social and policy issues in Oklahoma.