Christmas in Cambodia (continued)

The U.S. Census Bureau reported yesterday that in 2003, for the third consecutive year, there was an increase in the numbers of uninsured and impoverished Americans.

"Real median household income remained unchanged between 2002 and 2003 at $43,318," according to the agency. "At the same time, the nation’s official poverty rate rose from 12.1 percent in 2002 to 12.5 percent in 2003. The number of people with health insurance increased by 1.0 million to 243.3 million between 2002 and 2003, and the number without such coverage rose by 1.4 million to 45.0 million. The percentage of the nation’s population without coverage grew from 15.2 percent in 2002 to 15.6 percent in 2003."

Those who did get jobs were faced frequently with accepting scaled-back benefits and pension plans. Many workers did not receive cost of living increases.

That neutral sounding 12.5%, by the way, means that 35.8 million people were living in poverty. That's 1.3 million more than the year before. Adding to the pain, about 800,000 children made up more than half the increase, and the child poverty rate rose to 17.6% from from 16.7% a year earlier (the government's definition of poverty conveniently leads to an undercount -- the feds think two people are poor if they make less than $12,015 a year; the cutoff point for a family of four is $18,810).

Whites, blacks and Asians saw no significant change in median household income, but the income of Hispanics went down slightly. Though male worker's earnings held steady, wages fell for women age 15 and older working full-time year-round, the first annual decline for this category since 1995.

Swift boats. Millions in poverty. You decide.