On September 12, The Washington Examiner reported the following:

Median household incomes peaked at $78,250 in 2019, the year before the pandemic. They declined in 2022 to $74,580, a year that saw inflation soar, undercutting household purchasing power.

“Despite nominal gains, historically high inflation resulted in a decline in real median household income,” said Liana Fox, assistant division chief for economic characteristics in the Census Bureau’s Social, Economic, and Housing Statistics Division.

That’s about a $300 a month decrease.

The article continues:

The figures released on Tuesday showed that poverty was flat, with about 11.5% of the population, or 38 million people, below the poverty line, which was $29,678 for a family of four.

The bureau also reported a jump in child poverty by one metric, the supplemental poverty measure, or SPM, from 5.2% to 12.4%. The increase was attributable in large part to the expiration of the temporary expanded child tax credit implemented by Democrats and President Joe Biden as a form of pandemic relief. The SPM, unlike the official poverty measure, includes tax credits in calculating household resources.

The question that needs to be asked in next year’s election is, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?”