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What is the current poverty rate among Black and White populations in the US as of 2025?
Executive summary
The most authoritative recent source here is the U.S. Census Bureau’s “Poverty in the United States: 2024,” which reports the overall official poverty rate fell to 10.6% in 2024 and that poverty rates changed unevenly by race between 2023–2024 (official rates decreased for White groups but “did not change significantly for other race groups” in that period) [1]. Other analyses and secondary sources cite specific race-point estimates for 2023 and 2024 — for example, Statista reports a 2023 poverty rate of 17.9% for Black people and 7.7% for White people [2], while the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) cites 2023 rates of 18.5% for Black and 8.8% for non‑Hispanic White people [3].
1. What the Census Bureau (the primary source) says now
The Census Bureau’s 2024 poverty report gives the headline: the official U.S. poverty rate declined to 10.6% in 2024 with 35.9 million people in poverty, and it notes that between 2023 and 2024 the official poverty rate “decreased for White, Asian, and Hispanic individuals” while it “did not change significantly for other race groups discussed in this report” — i.e., the report does not present a statistically significant change for Black individuals in that one-year comparison in the official measure [1]. The report also emphasizes that the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) shows different levels and that SPM rates for Black individuals increased between 2023 and 2024 [1].
2. Race-specific point estimates reported elsewhere for 2023 and 2024
Secondary outlets using Census data report concrete race breakdowns: Statista’s table (sourced to Census data) lists the 2023 poverty rate as 17.9% for Black people and 7.7% for White people [2]. CBPP’s analysis cites 2023 rates of 18.5% for Black people and 8.8% for non-Hispanic White people [3]. Some outlets and compilations cite a 2024 Black poverty rate around 18.4% and note the Black rate is roughly 2.4 times the non‑Hispanic White rate in 2024, but that figure appears in an October 2025 commentary (jbhe) and is therefore later than the Census Bureau’s official 2024 release available here; the Census source itself emphasizes that official-rate changes for Black people were not statistically significant year-over-year [1] [4].
3. Official vs. Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM): different answers, different stories
The Census Bureau publishes both the official poverty measure and the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM). The official rate was 10.6% in 2024 [1]. The SPM typically yields different (often higher) poverty rates and captures program benefits and regional cost differences; the Census noted SPM rates increased for Black individuals between 2023 and 2024 while official rates did not change significantly for some groups [1]. That means which metric you cite matters: the official measure shows limited year-to-year movement for Black people in 2023–24, while the SPM indicates a worsening for Black Americans over that same interval [1].
4. Why different sources give slightly different numbers
Discrepancies across outlets arise because reporters use different measures (official vs. SPM), different race groupings (Black vs. non‑Hispanic Black, or Black alone vs. Black any race), and different years (2023 versus the newly released 2024 estimates). For example, CBPP reports 2023 poverty rates (18.5% for Black, 8.8% for non‑Hispanic White) drawing on Census tabulations or re‑analyses, while Statista’s 17.9%/7.7% pair is another representation of the 2023 Census tables [3] [2]. The Census 2024 report’s language stresses statistical significance and shows the official 2024 headline (10.6%) while warning that some subgroup trends differ under the SPM [1].
5. Framing: what the numbers imply and what they do not say
All sources show a persistent racial gap: Black poverty rates are materially higher than White rates in recent years [3] [2]. CBPP highlights that in 2023 Black and Latino poverty rates were more than double the non‑Hispanic White rate, and stresses how programs like SNAP and rental assistance reduce those disparities [3]. The Census report and commentators also caution that policy changes, program expirations, and measurement choice alter year‑to‑year comparisons, especially for the SPM [1] [3].
6. What’s missing or uncertain in current reporting
Available sources here do not present a single, clear official numeric pair labeled “Black poverty rate in 2024” and “White poverty rate in 2024” in the exact phrasing of your question; the Census 2024 release gives the overall official rate and notes subgroup trends and SPM changes but emphasizes statistical significance rather than giving a simple year‑over‑year point estimate pair for every racial subgroup in the snippets provided [1]. Some outlets quote 2023 race-specific rates [2] [3], and later commentaries compile 2024 subgroup rates, but those are not all from the Census text excerpts available here [4] [5].
If you want, I can extract the precise Census table values for Black and non‑Hispanic White poverty rates for 2023 and 2024 from the full Census tables and present both the official and SPM figures side‑by‑side (noting which measure each comes from).