Geography

Although a staggering half of New York City working-age households have inadequate income, city-wide level data masks considerable variation in household income inadequacy throughout the neighborhoods of the city. Rates of income inadequacy by Public Use Microdata Area (PUMA) vary from 26% in Murray Hill, Gramercy & Stuyvesant Town (South Manhattan) to 80% in Belmont, Crotona Park East & East Tremont (Central Bronx).

Altogether, there are 1,298,212 New York City working-age households struggling to make ends meet. Struggling households live throughout the city, however, almost three fourths of households with inadequate income live in Brooklyn (excluding Northwest), Queens, and the Bronx. While this section focuses on rates of income inadequacy by PUMA, other factors also contribute to income adequacy and wellness including access to reliable transportation, educational opportunity, health, and employment.28

Figure AA documents rates of income inadequacy by Public Use Microdata Area (PUMA) with the shading of blue corresponding with the percentage of households unable to make ends meet. Income inadequacy rates by borough are fairly consistent with the previous 2021 Overlooked and Undercounted report; the Bronx still has highest percentage of households struggling to make ends meet out of all five boroughs (see Table 2). North Manhattan now has the second highest percentage of households below the TCL with 57% unable to cover the basic costs, a jump of 19 percentage points since the last calculation.

The highest rates of households struggling with income inadequacy are found in the central Bronx region and include the community districts of Belmont, Crotona Park East & East Tremont; Hunts Point, Longwood & Melrose; Morris Heights, Fordham South & Mount Hope; and, Concourse, Highbridge & Mount Eden. These regions have income inadequacy rates between 75% and 80%, meaning at least three in four households living in those communities do not have earnings that meet cost of basic essentials like housing, health care, food, transportation, and child care. In Belmont, Crotona Park East, & East Tremont, 63% of the total population of that community identifies as Latine and 31% identify as Black. White householders make up less than 2% of the total population.

On the other hand, community regions with lower rates of income inadequacy (but still with at least a fourth of all households [26%] struggling to make ends meet) are visualized in Figure AA with a shade of light grey and are found in the South Manhattan neighborhoods of Murray Hill, Gramercy & Stuyvesant Town; Battery Park City,

Greenwich Village & Soho; and the Upper East Side, along with Park Slope, Carroll Gardens & Red Hook in Northwest Brooklyn, and Tottenville, Great Kills & Annadale in Staten Island. In Murray Hill, Gramercy & Stuyvesant Town, 66% of the population identifies as White and 19% as Asian, Native Hawaiian, or Pacific Islander. Latine householders make up 6% and Black households make up less than 4% of total households in that community district (see “Limitations” on page viii on aggregated data).

Due to the historical effects of institutionalized racism such as unequal access to investment in home buying, educational opportunity, and racist hiring practices, community districts with higher income inadequacy rates tend to have disproportional representation of people of color, particularly Black and Latine communities.

Income Inadequacy for Families by Borough

Rates of income inadequacy vary significantly by borough when analyzing by the presence of children in a home.

Figure AB illustrates the variance in the percentage of households with children struggling to cover costs, ranging from 31% in South Manhattan to 79% in the Bronx. The South Manhattan income inadequacy rate actually drops when there are children present (from 36% overall to 31% when accounting for the presence of at least one child). However in the Bronx the rate increases dramatically from 65% overall to 79% with the presence of children.