Monthly Poverty Remains Elevated in February
Monthly poverty remained elevated in February 2022, with a 14.4 percent poverty rate for the total US population. This is a slight decrease from 14.7 percent in January 2022, but a continuation of the spike from the December 2021 monthly poverty rate of 12.5 percent. Overall, 6 million more individuals were in poverty in February relative to December. Child poverty saw a small decline (0.3 percentage points) from 17.0 percent in January to 16.7 percent in February 2022. These levels also represent a continuation of the sharp increase in child poverty from December 2021, when the monthly child poverty rate was 12.1 percent.
January 2022 marked the first month that the American Rescue Plan’s expanded Child Tax Credit monthly payments expired, and child poverty rates increased sharply in response. Monthly child poverty is 4.6 percentage points (38 percent) higher in February 2022 than December 2021, representing 3.4 million additional children in poverty in February relative to December.
Measuring Monthly Poverty
In 2020, we established a novel method of forecasting poverty to provide monthly projections of poverty using the Supplemental Poverty Measure. Using a monthly framework, we are able to track poverty amidst changing economic circumstances as the COVID-19 pandemic and federal policy responses continue to unfold. Visit our data page to see monthly poverty trends for the US population as a whole, as well as by race/ethnicity and age groups.