Average US household income rebounded in 2023 to pre-pandemic levels

Inflation-adjusted median U.S. household income rebounded last year to roughly its 2019 level, outpacing the biggest price increase in four decades to restore purchasing power to most Americans.

The share of Americans living in poverty also fell slightly last year, to 11.1%, from 11.5% in 2022. But the ratio of women’s median incomes to men’s widened for the first time in more than two decades, as men’s incomes rose more than women’s in 2023.

The latest data came Tuesday in an annual report from the Census Bureau, which said median household income, adjusted for inflation, rose 4% to $80,610 in 2023, up from $77,450 in 2022.

It was the first increase since 2019, and is essentially unchanged from that year’s figure of $81,210, officials said. (The median income figure is the point at which half the population is above and half is below and is less distorted by extreme incomes than the average.)

“We’re back to the pre-COVID-19 peak that we experienced,” said Liana Fox, deputy director of the Census Bureau’s Social, Economic and Housing Statistics Division.

The numbers could become a talking point on the presidential campaign trail if Vice President Kamala Harris points to them as evidence that Americans’ financial health has largely recovered after inflation peaked at 9.1% in 2022.

On Wednesday, economists predict the government will report that inflation fell from 2.9% in July to 2.6% in August. The Federal Reserve, which targets inflation at 2%, is set to begin cutting interest rates next week.

Former President Donald Trump could counter that household incomes grew much faster in his first three years in office than in the first three years of the Biden-Harris administration, even though incomes fell during his administration after the pandemic erupted in 2020.

The data showed that while the typical American household regained its 2019 purchasing power in 2023, it experienced essentially no increase in living standards during that time.

This is a marked difference from the previous four years, when inflation-adjusted average incomes rose by 14% between 2015 and 2019.

The data is based on pre-tax income, including Social Security and other benefit programs, although it excludes non-cash benefits such as food stamps and Medicaid.

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