Hold The Cheers

While there's good news - sufficiently good to rate a lead story in Tuesday's New York Times - in several recent reports showing that median household incomes continue to rise and that advances among minorities have been noteworthy, the salient fact, as far as we're concerned, is how little the tide has risen for all boats in this buoyant economy.

According to a Census Bureau release this week, "the number of poor Americans in 1996 totaled 36.5 million, representing 13.7 percent of the nation's total population. . . . Neither figure was significantly different from the previous year's estimate. In 1996, the average poverty threshold for a family of four was $16,036."

In addition, "the number of uninsured children under 18 grew to 10.6 million (14.8 percent) in 1996; both the number and percentage were statistically higher than the 1995 figures of 9.8 million and 13.8 percent, respectively. Over all, an estimated 41.7 million, or 15.6 percent, of Americans had no health insurance during all of 1996."

To no one's surprise, the percentage of the nation's income claimed by the wealthiest fifth continued to rise, as it has more or less steadily over the past 30 years, in contrast to the other four-fifths of the populace.

Is our economy healthy? It would seem so. Until we erase poverty and make personal health insurance universal, however, the cheering will ring hollow.