Compared to other states, New Hampshire has a high median household income and a low official poverty rate. Yet nearly 100,000 Granite Staters live in poverty. In 2022, about one in four Granite State households had less than $50,000 per year in income, and about one in six had less than $35,000. Estimates of living costs in New Hampshire suggest many households are not able to make ends meet, with incomes often too limited to be able to afford the combined costs of housing, child care, transportation, and other necessities.
NHFPI aims to analyze and interpret the trends in income and poverty in the Granite State and provide insights into public policies designed to improve the economic security of New Hampshire’s residents.
A broken furnace, medical bill, or car repair could quickly become a financial crisis if it were to happen in any one of over 120,000 New Hampshire households with very little savings. An analysis recently published by the Urban Institute found that nearly one in four New Hampshire households lacked at least $2,000 in non-retirement ...
First published in New Hampshire Bulletin, December 22, 2025. As 2025 comes to an end, many Granite Staters are feeling the same things. Groceries cost more. Housing costs and property taxes are up. Health care is harder to afford and access. Too many of our neighbors feel it is a challenge to survive, let alone ...
First published in Business New Hampshire Magazine, November 21, 2025. Are Granite Staters better off economically than they were a year ago? In September, the U.S. Census Bureau released new data that shows while the financial well-being of Granite Staters did not get worse between 2023 and 2024, it did not improve either. For many ...
Last month, NHFPI held our 10th Annual Budget and Policy Conference, “Working Hard and Falling Behind: The High Cost of Living in New Hampshire,” where we convened experts from across ...
New Hampshire’s newest graduates are stepping into a job market filled with both opportunity and uncertainty. Even with low unemployment, many young people are beginning adulthood already in the red, as ...
First published in New Hampshire Bulletin, November 7, 2025. We may think of a government shutdown as something that happens in Washington, with gridlock between legislators, press conferences on the ...