Incomes Hit $100,000 For 1 in 4 Households
But Census Also Finds More Poverty in Region
By D'Vera Cohn and Dan Keating
Washington Post Staff
Writers
Thursday, May 30, 2002; Page A01
One in four households in the Washington area lives on an income of $100,000 a year or more, reflecting a decade of prosperity that drew thousands of well-off newcomers, lifted salaries and built whole communities of huge homes, according to census figures released yesterday.
But the census also tells a tale of troubling growth in poverty, which went up in a dozen of the region's 20 cities and counties. In some communities, there were increases in people without a ninth-grade education, in crowded homes and in households spending more than one-third of their incomes on mortgage payments.
The new numbers, drawn from the census long form that went to one in six American households, offer the most detailed social and economic portrait of the Washington area in a decade. They describe a shifting region that appears likely to retain its distinction as one of the nation's richest and best educated even as the middle class has shrunk and income disparities have increased.
Despite "all these problems associated with growth and all these inequities associated with income, it was a good decade," said Robert E. Lang, director of the Metropolitan Institute, a Virginia Tech think tank in Alexandria. "Probably the majority of residents of the Washington region had a good decade and saw it as a good decade."
The new census figures -- which will be available for the whole nation next week -- highlighted the benefits of the '90s boom in the Washington area: The number of households with incomes of $100,000 or more increased by 40 percent over the decade, after adjusting for inflation. That wealth was reflected in the number of homes with nine or more rooms, which grew by one-third. And the number of adults with graduate degrees increased to one in five.
The strong education credentials, big homes and top-end jobs arefactors that tend to reinforce each other, said regional economist Stephen Fuller, who teaches public policy at George Mason University.
"We have a better educated workforce," he said, with more adults in each household employed than in other areas. "And they happen to be working in the kind of jobs that have experienced higher income growth over the decade. The nature of the jobs that we've generated has attracted people with the skills to move here."
Among them was Lisa Miles, 32, who moved from Oregon to Loudoun County two years ago to become a manager at XO Communications, a telecommunications company that itself moved to this region in early 2000. She and her husband bought a house with more than 10 rooms.
"A whole lot of people out here look like me in terms of their background," she said. "They're transplants. They're well educated and making a lot of money. You just have to drive anywhere in suburbia, and all you see is big, beautiful, new houses, and you have to wonder, 'Who can afford these?' Clearly, there is this influx going on."
The census, which was taken in April 2000, captured the high point of the nation's longest period of economic growth, ended by last year's recession. But economists say Washington was hit less severely than other places, cushioned by the presence of the federal workforce and jobs tied to federal contracts.
Census data released last year showed that the Washington area was the fastest-growing metropolitan region outside the Sun Belt in the 1990s, with minority households contributing most of that increase.
The new figures affirmed the region's identity as a major destination for immigrants. A rising share of Washington area residents -- now one in six -- was born in another country, compared with one in nine a decade earlier.
And that multicultural flavor is widely apparent. In Arlington, one in threepeople speaks a language other than English at home, according to the census.
The new data included other measures of the phenomenal growth. Nearly one in five of the region's homes was built after 1990, for example. And commuting times, now an average of 32 minutes each way, grew at a rate likely to be higher than the national rate.
Prosperity did not touch each part of the region evenly. Incomes rose in nearly every jurisdiction over the decade, most spectacularly in the fast-growing outer counties such as Loudoun. But median income stayed flat in the District and fell in Prince George's County, when adjusted for inflation.
The Prince George's income decline, experts say, probably reflects the fact that it has more affordable housing than most communities and so has drawn lower-income families.
At the same time, it has experienced slower job growth than its neighbors. Despite that, the county is likely to retain its number one ranking for median income among the nation's majority-black jurisdictions, again exceeding well-off suburban Atlanta counties.
The census results underscore the increasing differences between suburban Maryland and Northern Virginia, largely because of Virginia's faster-growing economy. Virginia is drawing a greater share of immigrants, and incomes are rising faster there. Maryland now has longer average commutes than Northern Virginia, mostly because more Maryland residents are commuting to Virginia jobs, experts say.
Fuller said Virginia has drawn a greater share of the growing high-end services sector and "siphoned off the high-quality workers."
The highest median household incomes in the region are in Virginia, with Fairfax County retaining its No. 1 spot at $81,050, which means half the households are above that figure and half below. Fairfax ranks first among counties in the 41 states for which data have been released, indicating it could well retain the top spot it held after the 1990 Census.
On balance, the census figures indicate the decade expanded the ranks of the well-off more than it downgraded the circumstances of the poor. The middle-income groups grew more slowly than either the top or the bottom, reflecting a national trend.
In the District, middle-income families declined in number, as expected with a declining population. But by contrast, those at the low and high ends -- below $10,000 and above $100,000 -- increased in number.
Fuller said the widening income disparity in the region underscores the extent to which the lowest-income workers -- many of them immigrants -- are attracted here because of jobs created to serve the growing cadre of well-paid people at the top.
"We have people wash our cars and wax them and cut our grass," he said. "People used to do more of this kind of work for themselves in past generations. As the population gets wealthier, they are able to pay people to do things for them."
The region's high incomes also bought more housing in the 1990s. In Fairfax, Howard, Loudoun and Stafford counties, at least one in four homes has nine or more rooms. Some of those houses are luxury mansions on multi-acre plots, others clustered along cul-de-sacs on former farmland. Large homes predominate in Potomac and Great Falls. (When counting rooms, the Census Bureau does not count bathrooms, open porches, utility rooms or unfinished basements.)
In the late '90s, Heidi Stirrup, her husband and their daughter moved from a ranch-style house in South Arlington to western Prince William County, where they bought a five-bedroom neo-Colonial on 22 acres.
"I grew up accustomed to lots of land," said Stirrup, who was raised in Wisconsin. And she bemoaned what she called a growing gulf between immigrants and native-born Americans in her old neighborhood. The newcomers, she said, "didn't speak English, and that was very frustrating."
The census also showed a small increase in the number of homes considered severely crowded, meaning they average more than 1 1/2 people per room. These homes are most likely to be concentrated in the District, Arlington, Alexandria and Prince George's.
Some academics question that definition of crowding, saying that many immigrant families and others do not consider it a problem to live with relatives in close quarters.
In the District and suburban Maryland, more households are spending more than one-third of their income on mortgage costs. Housing specialists say that could mean they are paying more than they can afford for housing.
The increase was most dramatic in Prince George's County, where one in five now spends that much.
However, the share of renters spending more than one-third of their income on rent and utilities went down over the decade, despite a tight housing market.
Poverty figures also rose, mainly in the closer-in counties and the District. Regionally, the poverty rate among children rose slightly, translating into nearly 33,000 additional children in poverty.
Some of the region's highest-poverty tracts are near military bases, such as Quantico Marine Corps Base, and in areas with large numbers of college students, such as College Park. Others are concentrated inside the Capital Beltway in Prince George's County and along Route 1 in Fairfax County. In the District, 20 percent of residents were in poverty at the time of the census. Some experts explain at least part of the rise in poverty by the increase in immigration.
Drew Dedrick, chief of research for the Montgomery County planning office, said that although his country draws large numbers of well-educated, affluent immigrants, he believes a growing share are starting from scratch when they move to this country.
Still, he said, he believes they will move up the ladder as previous generations have, in part because they already have overcome hardships to get here.
"I feel optimistic about those folks who are willing to come to Montgomery County," he said. "The people who come here, especially in the lower income groups, are making a sacrifice to come here."
That is the story of Fiorella Izquierdo, 30, who moved to Northern Virginia from Peru in 1995. There, she was a college student. Here, she began her new life as a babysitter and now does part-time clerical work at the Hispanic Committee of Northern Virginia while raising two young daughters. Her husband works for the U.S. Postal Service.
But Izquierdo has plans. She wants to improve her English, for her daughters' sake. She intends to complete college. "I think I am lucky," she said.
Staff writers Lisa Rein and Peter Whoriskey contributed to this report.