Family Poverty Rates

• The U.S. Census reported that 8.8% of all families in the U.S. had incomes below the poverty line in 2019. Wisconsin was somewhat lower and Minnesota a much lower average proportion of their families living in poverty.
• With the exception of Burnett County, the other St. Croix River Valley counties have substantially lower proportions of families with incomes below the poverty level compared to their respective state averages.
   

• The percentage of families with incomes below the poverty line grew slightly in Wisconsin and most of its St. Croix River Valley counties from 2010 until 2014. Since 2014 it has declined.
• Burnett County was a bit of an exception in that the percentage of its families living in poverty was flat to slightly down over the 2010 to 2014 period and has declined more rapidly than the state.
• Polk County has consistently had a slightly lower proportion of its families with incomes below the poverty line than the Wisconsin average, St. Croix County has consistently been substantially below the state average, and Pierce County intermediary between those two counties.
• The percentage of families with incomes below the poverty line has been growing in Pierce and St. Croix counties in the last three years, but has not reached the highest percentage for those counties over the time period (which happened in the 2010s).
   

• The percentage of families with incomes below the poverty line was flat to slightly increasing over the 2010 to 2014 period in Minnesota, Chisago County and Washington County and declined slightly until 2019.
• The percentage of families with incomes below the poverty line has consistently been much lower in both Washington and Chisago counties than in Minnesota as a whole.
• Chisago County, despite having a substantially lower median household income than Washington County has similar or lower proportions of its families with incomes below the poverty line.
• Although the percentage of families with incomes below the poverty line has risen in Chisago County since 2020, it is still below the levels recorded at the beginning of the 2010s.
   

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