Tracking the COVID-19 Recession’s Effects on Food, Housing, and Employment Hardships

Joblessness remains high and millions report that their households did not get enough to eat or are not caught up on rent payments. We are able to track the extent of this hardship thanks to nearly real-time data from several sources on the unfolding economic crisis.

The impacts of the pandemic and the economic fallout have been widespread, but are particularly prevalent among Black, Latino,^[1] Indigenous, and immigrant households. These disproportionate impacts reflect harsh, longstanding inequities — often stemming from structural racism — in education, employment, housing, and health care that the current crisis is exacerbating.

The American Rescue Plan Act, enacted on March 11, is projected to dramatically begin reducing poverty and narrowing disparities by race. Any reduction in hardship, particularly among children, would be a hopeful step for the country. Households with children face especially high hardship rates and considerable evidence suggests that reducing childhood hardship and poverty would yield improvements in education and health, higher productivity and earnings, less incarceration, and other lasting benefits to children and society.

Emerging Data Show High Rates of Hardship

The Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey, launched in April 2020, has provided nearly real-time data on how the unprecedented health and economic crisis is affecting the nation. Data from this and other sources, such as unemployment data from Census’ Current Population Survey and the Department of Labor, show that tens of millions of people are out of work and struggling to afford adequate food and pay the rent. The impacts on children are large (see figures 1, 4, and 5).

For more on our methodology and data by state, see tables 1-5 at the end of this document.

Difficulty Getting Enough Food

Data from several sources show a dramatic increase in the number of households struggling to put enough food on the table. Some 18 million adults — 9 percent of all adults in the country — reported that their household sometimes or often didn’t have enough to eat in the last seven days, according to Household Pulse Survey data collected March 17-29. This was above the pre-pandemic rate: a survey released by the Agriculture Department found that 3.4 percent of adults reported that their household had “not enough to eat” at some point over the full 12 months of 2019.^[2] When asked why, 76 percent said they “couldn’t afford to buy more food,” rather than (or in addition to) non-financial factors such as lack of transportation or safety concerns due to the pandemic.

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Adults in households with children were likelier to report that the household didn’t get enough to eat: 11 percent, compared to 7 percent for households without children. (See Figure 1.) And 7 to 13 percent of adults with children reported that their children sometimes or often didn’t eat enough in the last seven days because they couldn’t afford it, well above the pre-pandemic figure. Households typically first scale back on food for adults before cutting back on what children have to eat. (The 7-13 percent range reflects the different ways to measure food hardship in the Household Pulse Survey.)

Also, analysis of more detailed data from the Pulse survey collected March 3-15 shows that between 6 and 11 million children live in a household where children didn’t eat enough because the household couldn’t afford it. These figures are approximations; the Pulse Survey was designed to provide data on adult well-being, not precise counts of children.

Black and Latino adults were more than twice as likely as white adults to report that their household did not get enough to eat: 16 percent each, compared to 6 percent of white adults. Adults who identify as American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, or as multiracial, taken together,^[3] were twice as likely as white adults to report that their household did not get enough to eat, at 12 percent. (See Figure 2.)

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Inability to Pay Rent or Mortgage

The Household Pulse data also show that millions are not caught up on their rent or mortgage payments. Unfortunately, there are two concerns with the housing questions. First, the Census Bureau reworded the rent payment question starting with the late-August 2020 survey, making the results non-comparable to earlier weeks of the survey. Second, Census at the same time made the entire survey longer, which led more respondents to skip questions toward the end of the survey, including the housing questions. This “non-response” is higher among groups that are younger, have lower levels of education, and identify as Black or Latino — groups that are more likely to struggle to afford rent, due to longstanding inequities often stemming from structural racism in education, employment, and housing. For these reasons, the Pulse data likely understate the number of people struggling to pay rent.

Even with these issues, however, the data indicate that millions are having difficulty paying rent. An estimated 10.7 million adults living in rental housing — 15 percent of adult renters — were not caught up on rent, according to data collected March 17-29.^[4] Here, too, renters of color were more likely to report that their household was not caught up on rent: 22 percent of Black renters, 20 percent of Latino renters, and 19 percent of Asian renters said they were not caught up on rent, compared to 9 percent of white renters. The rate was 18 percent for American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, and multiracial adults taken together. (See Figure 3.)

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In addition, 21 percent of renters who are parents or otherwise live with children reported that they were not caught up on rent, compared to 10 percent among adults not living with anyone under age 18. (See Figure 4.)

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Children in renter households also face high rates of food hardship. Over 1 in 4 children living in rental housing live in a household that didn’t have enough to eat, according to data for March 3-15 (the latest detailed data that allow us to make these estimates). And 4 in 10 children living in rental housing live in a household that either isn’t getting enough to eat or is not caught up on rent. (See Figure 5.)

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While households that don’t rent their homes but have mortgage payments typically have higher incomes than renters, they, too, can face difficulties, especially if they have lost their jobs or seen their incomes fall significantly. An estimated 9.5 million adults are in a household that is not caught up in its mortgage payment.^[5]

Difficulty Covering Household Expenses

Since late August, the Household Pulse Survey has provided data on the overall number of adults struggling to cover usual household expenses such as food, rent or mortgage, car payments, medical expenses, or student loans. Some 67 million adults — 29 percent of all adults in the country — reported it was somewhat or very difficult for their household to cover usual expenses in the past seven days, according to data collected March 17-29. While we don’t have comparable data from before the pandemic, the data noted above on rising levels of food hardship over pre-pandemic rates suggest that economic insecurity has increased.

Adults in households with children were more likely to report difficulty paying for usual expenses: 34 percent, compared to 26 percent for adults without children. Financial hardship can have serious effects on children’s long-term health and education, research shows.^[6]

In addition, Latino and Black adults reported difficulty covering expenses at higher rates: 43 percent and 42 percent, respectively, compared to 27 percent for Asian adults and 23 percent for white adults. (See Figure 6.) The rate was 38 percent for American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, and multiracial adults taken together.

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An estimated 42 percent of children live in households that have trouble covering usual expenses, according to our analysis of detailed data from the Pulse survey collected March 3-15. They include 62 percent of children in Black households, 54 percent of children in Latino households, 34 percent of children in Asian households, and 31 percent of children in white households. (The Pulse survey asks the race of the adult respondent, not the children.)

Unemployment Is High, With Job Losses Concentrated in Low-Paid Industries

The unemployment rate jumped in April 2020 to a level not seen since the 1930s — and still stood at 6.0 percent in March 2021. Some 9.6 percent of Black workers and 7.9 percent of Latino workers were unemployed in March, compared to 5.4 percent of white workers. Unemployment has also risen faster among workers who were born outside the United States (this includes individuals who are now U.S. citizens) than U.S.-born workers. Changes in unemployment going forward will likely heavily depend on both how well the nation does in controlling the spread of the virus and the steps policymakers take to provide effective stimulus that boosts overall demand for goods and services.

The majority of jobs lost in the crisis have been in industries that pay low average wages, with the lowest-paying industries accounting for 30 percent of all jobs but 56 percent of the jobs lost from February 2020 to March 2021, the latest month of Labor Department employment data. Jobs in low-paying industries were down more than twice as much between February 2020 and March 2021 (9.3 percent) as jobs in medium-wage industries (4.4 percent) and more than three times as much as in high-wage industries (2.7 percent). (See Figure 7.)

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Data from the Census Bureau’s basic monthly Current Population Survey released March 10, 2021 provide more detail on unemployed workers and their family members. Some 27 million people either met the official definition of “unemployed” (meaning they actively looked for work in the last four weeks or were on temporary layoff) or lived with an unemployed family member in February. This figure includes nearly 7 million children.

The official definition of “unemployed” leaves out many workers deprived of pay amid the pandemic, including some 4.2 million workers in February who did not look for work “because of the coronavirus pandemic,” according to the Labor Department. The official definition also omits over 700,000 workers who reported that they had a job but that they were absent from work without pay and lost pay in the last four weeks “because their employer closed or lost business due to the coronavirus pandemic,” we calculate.

When family members are considered, as many as 38 million people in February, including nearly 10 million children, lived in a family where at least one adult did not have paid work in the last week because of unemployment or the pandemic, we estimate.

State-by-State Food, Housing, and Employment Hardship Data

Data by state show that hardship is widespread. The following tables provide state-level data on:

• the share of adults reporting that their household didn’t have enough to eat (Table 1);
• the share of adults saying children in their household were not eating enough because they couldn’t afford enough (Table 1);
• the increase in SNAP caseloads (Table 2);
• the share of adults not caught up on rent (Table 3);
• the share of adults saying their household had difficulty paying for their usual expenses (Table 4); and
• the three-month moving average unemployment rate and recent jobless claim data (Table 5).

For data from the Pulse survey we average data collected March 3-15 and March 17-29 to improve the accuracy of the state estimates.

Differences in Pulse hardship rates between states may reflect sampling error, so we suggest not drawing strong conclusions from modest differences between states. The data do show, however, that high levels of hardship are widespread across the country.

Difficulty Getting Enough Food

The Pulse survey asks adult respondents if their household did not have enough to eat and if children in the household were not eating enough because the household couldn’t afford it.

Table 2 shows the number of SNAP participants based on recent data available for each state through August compared to February 2020, the last month before the economic effects of the pandemic hit. Available data suggest that 6-7 million more people have applied and been approved for benefits since February, a 17 percent increase nationally. This rise is unprecedented: at the onset of the Great Recession it took 17 months to add this number of people to SNAP. While SNAP participation in most states is still substantially lower than during the peak months after the Great Recession, the increase so far due to COVID-19 has been rapid.

Based on this state data the number of people nationally participating in SNAP appears to have leveled at about 43 million over May through August, though in some states over the summer it continued to grow and in others it fell. The differences in the trends in caseloads across states reflect multiple factors including:

• Differences in job losses across the months of the pandemic and the degree to which businesses were operating;
• How quickly states adapted their SNAP application processes to almost entirely remote communications (i.e., online and telephone) and the degree to which they made use of flexibilities offered to help them manage their workloads;^[6]
• How many people received unemployment insurance since the pandemic began in the state and how quickly states processed applications for unemployment insurance (UI) in the spring and early summer (which would have provided income to people who otherwise might have qualified for SNAP);

The slower growth over the summer months may reflect states taking higher income from UI benefits into account (for households that were approved for UI in late April or May), in addition to increased earnings from the economy partially reopening in some places. But UI income fell substantially as a result of the expiration of the temporary $600-per-week federal UI supplement at the end of July, which may have resulted in more SNAP applications in August and September. SNAP caseloads also shrink when the economy is strong, as they did in the years leading up to the COVID-19-related downturn.

Not Caught Up on Rent

Table 3 shows the estimated number of adults whose household was not caught up on rent by state. The Census Bureau reworded the Pulse survey’s rent payment question starting with the late-August 2020 survey, so these rent hardship figures results are not comparable to data from earlier weeks of the Pulse survey. In addition, Census at the same time made the entire survey longer, which led more respondents to skip questions toward the end of the survey, including the housing questions. Non-response is higher among groups that are younger, have lower levels of education, and identify as Black or Latino — groups that are more likely to struggle to afford rent, due to longstanding inequities that often stem from structural racism in education, employment, and housing. Therefore, the Pulse data likely understate the number of people struggling to pay rent.

Difficulty Covering Usual Household Expenses

The Pulse survey asks adult respondents if their household had difficulty paying for usual expenses such as food, rent or mortgage, car payments, medical expenses, or student loans in the last seven days. Table 4 shows the estimated number and percent of adults reporting that it was somewhat or very difficult for their household to pay for their usual expenses in the last seven days.

High Unemployment

Table 5 provides state-by-state data on the unemployment rate over the January-March 2021 period and data on ongoing unemployment benefit claims.

Unemployment in most states has been highly elevated since April 2020, as has the number of people claiming unemployment insurance benefits.