The Census Bureau said Thursday that the ranks of the poor and medically uninsured rose substantially in 2003, providing two pieces of sobering news for President Bush just before the Republican National Convention.
Last year, the report said, 1.3million more Americans were living in poverty than a year earlier as the ranks of the poor swelled to nearly 35.9 million, or 12.5 percent of the population.
The number of people without health insurance rose 1.4 million to 45 million, or 15.6 percent of the population, chiefly because of an uncertain job market. At the same time, the bureau added, the number of insured Americans actually increased by 1 million to a record 243.3 million, a figure the GOP trumpeted.
It was the third straight year that the number of both the poor and the uninsured had gone up, largely the result of an economy that sank into a recession and performed below par during most of the 2001-03 period.
The poverty and health insurance figures, along with a third census number showing income stagnated in 2003, gave Democrats new data to bolster their claims that the economy under Bush has hurt poor and working-class Americans.
Such figures have lifted the plight of poor Americans higher on the nation’s political agenda, with Republicans and Democrats pushing separate agendas for relief. In general, the GOP is relying on tax cuts and tax incentives while Democrats are calling for more spending on federal programs.
Poverty hit children and women particularly hard. According to the report, 12.9 million children, or 17.6 percent of the under-18 population, were living in poverty. That was an increase of about 800,000 from 2002, representing the largest rise in child poverty in a decade. Poverty also increased sharply among adult women, reaching a 12.4 percent rate.
Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, said in a statement that while Bush “tries to convince America’s families that we’re turning the corner, slogans and empty rhetoric can’t hide the real story. Under George Bush’s watch, America’s families were falling further behind.”
In a town hall meeting in Anoka, Minn., a Minneapolis suburb, Kerry ticked off numerous statistics from the census report and indicated that voters will hear more of them in the future.
“The census figures are facts,” he said. “They don’t have a political label on them. … And they tell a story when you add them all up.”
Bush team cites ’04 progress
Bush administration officials said the figures failed to take into account economic progress in 2004. They also blamed Democrats for blocking proposals that would increase the number of insured by cutting the costs of health insurance for business.
“The big failure is not what is happening in the administration,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson. “Individuals in the Senate have failed to adopt the president’s health-care plan.”
House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) called on Kerry and his running mate, Sen. John Edwards, to push for Senate passage of a GOP plan to control medical liability costs, as well as a proposal to allow small companies to buy insurance for their employees through private health associations.
Campaigning in New Mexico, Bush made no mention of the census figures. He said his administration had overcome the obstacles of a recession, terrorist attacks and corporate scandals. He credited the American workforce, the country’s entrepreneurial spirit and his “well-timed tax cuts.”
Democrats cited rising numbers of the poor and uninsured over the past three years. On top of that, Kerry and other Democrats frequently point to a recent Congressional Budget Office study showing that the Bush tax cuts in effect forced the middle class to pay a higher percentage of the total tax burden.
That study, disputed for its methodology, indicated that the wealthiest taxpayers have seen their tax burden fall from 64.4 percent to 63.5 percent of total taxes paid since 2001, while middle-class taxpayers have seen their tax burden rise from 18.7 to 19.5 percent of total taxes paid.
During the 1990s economic boom, poverty became less of a political issue as Congress adopted welfare reform and more jobs were available for the poor. But poverty has increased as the economy has underperformed, with evidence growing that women and children are being hurt the most.
“Over the last three years, more and more women have fallen into poverty, with the loss of jobs, decrease in wages and increase in the number of uninsured helping to push many women into an uncertain and potentially devastating financial situation,” said Christina Smith FitzPatrick, senior policy analyst for the National Women’s Law Center in Washington.
Day-to-day struggle
Lori Cesaire, 32, of Springfield, Ohio, said she and her husband struggle to make ends meet on a take-home pay she estimated at about $13,000 a year. With that money, she said, they must feed, clothe and house their three children, ages 14, 10 and 4. The poverty rate for a family of five is gross pay of a little over $22,000.
Cesaire said she is a day-care teacher and that her husband is a security guard and often works 65 hours a week. They see their income eaten up by bills, transportation, food and clothing.
“You have to be creative” in making ends meet, she said, and often she staggers paying her bills so she is no more than one month behind in any single bill. Cesaire said she uses various charitable organizations to get everything from food to furniture but often has to withhold buying shoes for one child because another needs them more.
She said she works even though she has a disability.
“It’s harder on me,” she said. “It would be so easy for me to stay at home.” The working poor often are forced to work harder, she said, while “those who don’t do anything get all the assistance.”
Census income figures showed that real median earnings of men who worked full-time was unchanged at $40,668, while the real median earnings for women declined by 0.6 percent to $30,724. It was the first time since 1999 that men had gained ground against women in that category.
Some Democrats claimed the administration purposely released the numbers for poverty, income and uninsured people at the same time and a long way from Election Day, but census officials denied politics was involved.
