Every day more than 10,000 people in the United States turn 65. From 1969 to 2020, the portion of people over age 65 who were poor fell dramatically—from more than 1 in 4 (27.3%) in 1969 to fewer than 1 in 10 (8.9%) in 2020.* However, from 2020 to 2021, the downward trend reversed. The portion of older people living in poverty increased from 8.9% to 10.3%—an increase of almost 1 million older people for a total of close to 6 million older individuals. Over the same year, the portion of older women living in poverty grew from 10.1% to close to 11.6% representing to one-half million women. [i]
[i] U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey (2022), Historical Poverty Tables: People and Families -1959 to 2021. https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/income-poverty/historical-poverty-people.html
