Median Household Income

The middle value of all household incomes in a geographic area, meaning half earn more and half earn less.

Median household income is sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS), which publishes annual 1-year estimates for geographies with populations over 65,000 and 5-year rolling estimates for smaller geographies down to the Census tract level. The most recent ACS 5-year estimates put national median household income at approximately $75,000, with state medians ranging from about $53,000 in Mississippi to $95,000 in Maryland and county medians spanning from roughly $30,000 in persistent-poverty rural counties to over $150,000 in affluent suburbs like Loudoun County VA and Santa Clara County CA. ChildcareCost uses county-level ACS 5-year median household income as the denominator in the Childcare Burden Index because ACS is the authoritative federal source of county income data and its 5-year estimates provide stable values even for small counties. Using the median (rather than mean) prevents extreme incomes at either tail from skewing the picture of what a typical family earns, a particularly important consideration in counties with high income inequality where a handful of very high earners can pull the mean far above the experience of most households. A limitation of using median household income is that childcare costs are borne disproportionately by households with children, and households with children have different income profiles than retirees, single-adult households, and empty-nesters. Some analyses use "median family income" (families with related children) or "median income for households with children under 6" instead, typically showing incomes 10% to 25% higher than the overall household median, which reduces calculated burden percentages but not the absolute affordability problem. ACS income estimates are reported in inflation-adjusted dollars and are released annually each December.

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