Spotlight on life in New York City during COVID-19

COVID-19 has upended life for New Yorkers. Using Poverty Tracker data, we explore the impacts the crisis has had on employment and income, housing security, food hardship, and internet access and remote learning. The crisis exacerbated  hardships across the city, but the lives of the poorest New Yorkers and communities of color have been disproportionately impacted. 

Nearly half of all New York City workers lost employment income since March of 2020. More than half of low-wage workers and more than half of Black and Latino workers lost employment income at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak.  

Many New Yorkers who lost their jobs also struggled to access unemployment benefits, and a quarter of renters in the Poverty Tracker sample could not pay their rent at some point during the pandemic. The crisis also intensified the already high levels of food hardship in the city and exposed the digital divide. Across the city, families without access to computers with internet fear their children will fall further behind. 

In the News: A New Survey of New Yorkers Exposes Pandemic Inequality

The Poverty Tracker is a longitudinal study of the dynamics of poverty and disadvantage in New York City. It is a joint project of Robin Hood and Columbia University.