More Americans are on public assistance. The average monthly number of persons participating in at least one major federal public assistance program in 1991 was 30.9 million, up from 28.5 million in 1990. More students are remaining in school. The annual high school dropout rate for persons aged 14 to 24 enrolled in grades 10 through 12 declined from 6.3 percent in 1973 to 4.2 percent in 1993. An estimated 39.7 million people were without health insurance coverage during the entire 1993 calendar year, 1.1 million more than in 1992.
More people are poor.
The number of Americans living below the poverty level increased from 38.0 million in 1992 to 39.3 million in 1993. This was the fourth straight year that the number of persons living in poverty has increased. In 1993, 15.1 percent of all Americans were poor, a rate that was not statistically different from the previous year. The percent of all parent-child family groups maintained by single parents rose from 13 percent in 1970 to 30 percent in 1993. Nursery school enrollment has more than doubled from 1.3 million in 1973 to 3.0 million in 1993, due in part to the increasing educational levels and labor force participation rates of mothers.