Today the Census Bureau released new American Community Survey (ACS), 1-year estimates. This includes data for states, communities, and congressional districts on a wealth of topics, including income, poverty, health insurance, housing, education, disability and much more for the most recent year available (2023).  

You can find the data here. For a reminder on how to access the data, please reference CHN’s September 5 webinar here (and to see the instructional slides go here).  

[Special note:  starting on September 13, CHN will post tables with poverty by race and age for all states plus Puerto Rico, as part of its online Poverty Resource Library, with more tables, including for all congressional districts, coming soon.]  

One of the highlights from today’s release was that nearly half of renters in the U.S. were “cost-burdened,” with significant racial disparities evident. 

“Housing costs rose between 2022 and 2023 for both homeowners and renters. The median cost of housing for renters rose from $1,354 to $1,406 (after adjusting for inflation),” said Molly Ross, a Survey Statistician with the Census Bureau. “And new data from the 2023 ACS, 1-year estimates show that the share of a rented household’s income that goes towards these housing costs differs by race.” 

Overall, according to the Census Bureau, over 21 million renter households spent more than 30 percent of their income on housing costs in 2023, representing nearly half (49.7 percent) of the 42.5 million renters in the U.S. for whom rent burden is calculated. 

The Census Bureau also published a report showing changes in health insurance coverage in states from 2013 to 2019 (when most of the Affordable Care Act expansions took effect) and then from 2019 to 2023, when coverage was expanded due to the pandemic emergency (followed by renewed restrictions starting in 2023). The percentage of uninsured children nationwide declined from 7.5 percent in 2013 to 5.4 percent in 2023. The uninsured rate for children decreased in 37 states in the earlier period, and further decreased in 17 states in the later period. However, there was a troubling increase in the number of uninsured children from 5.1 percent in 2022 to 5.5 percent in 2023. The percentage of uninsured working age adults dropped nationwide from 20.5 percent in 2013 to 11 percent in 2023 (for these adults, the uninsured rate declined from 11.3 percent in 2022 to 11 percent in 2023). For working age adults (age 19-64), the uninsured rate decreased in all states in the earlier period, and further declined in 42 states from 2019 to 2023. Because Medicaid disenrollment at the end of the pandemic public health emergency was just beginning during the ACS survey period, it is likely that more recent data will show reversals of some of the important progress in reducing the number of uninsured people. 

Households are considered cost-burdened when they spend more than 30 percent of their income on rent, mortgage payments, and other housing costs, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Households spending more than 50 percent of their income on housing costs are considered severely cost-burdened. 

“Within Black or African American alone rental households, or households where the householder identified as being only Black or African American, 4.6 million (56.2 percent) paid more than 30 percent of their income on housing costs in 2023,” the Census Bureau reported. “Another 2.0 million (54.7 percent) Some Other Race alone renter households were cost-burdened.” About 2.5 million (30.6%) Black alone and 1.1 million (28.8%) Some Other Race alone renter householders were severely cost-burdened. 

Among other race groups: 1 million (43.4 percent) of Asian renters were cross-burdened; 10.4 million (46.7 percent) of Whites; 229,000 (48.8 percent) of American Indian or Alaskan Native; 53,000 (51.7 percent) of Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander; and 4.8 million (53.2 percent) of Hispanics. 

It’s because of this kind of invaluable data that CHN works to ensure that the ACS and the Census Bureau are adequately funded.