Median income has shrunk faster since recession ended

• Reprints

Updated: November 16, 2011 12:44PM

New research shows that the recession was just the first blow to people’s incomes. Median incomes nationwide fell more rapidly in the two years after the recession ended than during the recession itself, according to research released Monday by Sentier Research, an Annapolis, Md.-based statistical analysis firm. It analyzed data from the Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The results showed:

†During the recession, median household income adjusted for inflation fell by 3.2 percent, to $53,518. The study defined that period as December 2007 to June 2009.

†Median income fell at more than double that rate, by another 6.7 percent to $49,909, from June 2009 to this past June.

†Self-employed households saw the largest percentage decline in yearly income after the recession, down 8.4 percent, to $64,816.

†By race, African-American households suffered the biggest percentage decline after the recession, down 9.4 percent to $31,784. White households’ incomes declined the least, by 4.7 percent, to $56,320.

†Young people ages 25-34 and the elderly ages 62-64 suffered the biggest percentage household income declines after the recession, down 9.8 and 10.7 percent, respectively.

The combined declines in overall household median income appear to be the largest in decades, the report concluded.

Gordon Green and John Coder, former U.S. Census Bureau officials who now are principals at Sentier Research, said “a decline of this magnitude represents a significant reduction in the American standard of living.”

Green said in an interview Monday that today’s economy is uniquely hurt by a combination of prolonged and high unemployment, intense global competition and people still struggling to pay off debts from the housing bubble implosion.