The Economy League of Philadelphia has updated its previous analyses of income inequality in Philadelphia - using the most recent estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau - by examining earnings gaps among different racial, ethnic, and gender groups.
Here's what it found:
- In 2021, Philadelphia’s median household income tracked at $52,650.
- Black and Latino/Hispanic households in Philadelphia reported median household incomes far below the city’s overall 2021 median, by $13,297 and $13,837 respectively.
- Philadelphia’s non-Hispanic White households reported a median household income of $74,279 in 2021; this is $21,630 above the city’s median, roughly $18,400 above the city’s Asian households’ median, almost $35,000 above Black households’ median, and approximately $35,500 above Latino/Hispanic households’ median.
- Only 14 of the 142 majority non-Hispanic White neighborhoods of the city (roughly 10%) saw a median household income below the city’s median in 2021.
- Most majority non-Hispanic Black neighborhoods in Philadelphia (roughly 76%) saw a median household income below the city’s 2021 median.
- All but one out of the 25 Latino/Hispanic majority neighborhoods of Philadelphia saw a median household income below the city’s 2021 median.
- The sole majority Asian neighborhood in Philadelphia saw a 2021 median household income $38,418 above the city’s median.
- Philadelphia neighborhoods without any distinct racial or ethnic majority residential population were more evenly divided with 59% seeing a median household income below the city’s 2021 median and 41% seeing a median household income above the city’s median.
- Full-time, year-round non-Hispanic White female workers in Philadelphia in 2021 earned $0.88 for every non-Hispanic White male dollar earned – a one cent increase since 2020.
- Both Asian females and males in Philadelphia earned $0.75 to every white male dollar earned in 2021, the only racial or ethnic group in the city to see earnings equality between the binary genders.
- Full-time, year-round, salaried Black females earned $0.59 for every white male dollar earned in Philadelphia in 2021 and $0.02 less than Black males.
- Philadelphia’s full-time, year-round, salaried Latina/Hispanic females saw the lowest overall earnings in comparison with white males at $0.55.
- Philadelphia’s full-time, year-round, salaried Latino/Hispanic males earned $0.05 more than Latina/Hispanic females in 2021, but $0.40 less than non-Hispanic White males.
- Philadelphia’s patterns of wage inequality in 2021 largely mirrored Boston and New York City where white male and female median earnings were typically followed by Asian earnings, then Black earnings, and finally Latino/Hispanic earnings.
- Non-Hispanic White male median earnings in Philadelphia in 2021, at $69,473, trailed non-Hispanic White male median earnings in New York City and Boston by more than $20,000.
- Unlike Philadelphia, patterns of wage inequality differed for Pittsburgh, Baltimore, and Washington D.C. where median earnings among Asian residents, for example, either outpaced or were very similar to some non-Hispanic White median earnings and Latino/Hispanic median earnings surpassed Black median earnings.
- Pittsburgh recorded the highest proportional median earnings for Black workers of the six peer Northeast U.S. cities in 2021.
- Philadelphia’s patterns of wage inequality are currently trending like Boston and New York City – two cities well known for their very high levels of income inequality.
