US cities where median household income fell since 1990, in real dollars

Most American cities are richer than they were in 1990, but a sizable group is not. After adjusting 1990 incomes into 2024 dollars using the BLS Consumer Price Index, we compared median household income for every US city of 50,000 or more residents across the two endpoints. In 843 cities with both data points, 593 are richer and 250 are poorer than they were 34 years ago in real terms.

Doral, Florida tops the decline list at −$42,362 in real median household income since 1990. The 25 cities with the steepest real income losses are below.

#	Place	1990 (in 2024 $)	Latest	Change
1	Doral, Florida	$136,526	$94,164	−$42,362
2	Dunwoody, Georgia	$163,850	$121,903	−$41,947
3	Diamond Bar, California	$145,567	$108,281	−$37,286
4	Sterling Heights, Michigan	$111,531	$79,909	−$31,622
5	Missouri City, Texas	$124,765	$94,390	−$30,375
6	Southfield, Michigan	$97,392	$68,166	−$29,226
7	Dearborn Heights, Michigan	$88,253	$60,391	−$27,862
8	DeSoto, Texas	$109,323	$82,782	−$26,541
9	Orland Park, Illinois	$124,199	$98,910	−$25,289
10	Florissant, Missouri	$88,344	$65,318	−$23,026
11	Richardson, Texas	$120,579	$98,111	−$22,468
12	Spring Valley, Nevada	$96,884	$74,511	−$22,373
13	Warren, Michigan	$86,354	$64,016	−$22,338
14	Apple Valley, Minnesota	$119,958	$97,673	−$22,285
15	Westland, Michigan	$83,990	$62,076	−$21,914
16	Danbury, Connecticut	$105,200	$83,393	−$21,807
17	Kendall, Florida	$108,730	$87,325	−$21,405
18	Waterbury, Connecticut	$73,281	$51,886	−$21,395
19	Farmington Hills, Michigan	$124,770	$104,836	−$19,934
20	Fountain Valley, California	$135,016	$115,237	−$19,779
21	Palatine, Illinois	$116,807	$97,819	−$18,988
22	Palmdale, California	$100,740	$81,770	−$18,970
23	Dearborn, Michigan	$83,784	$65,324	−$18,460
24	Livonia, Michigan	$116,751	$98,460	−$18,291
25	Kendale Lakes, Florida	$89,791	$71,621	−$18,170

Key findings

• Doral, Florida leads the list at −$42,362.
• The 25th-ranked city on this list — Kendale Lakes, Florida — shows −$18,170.
• Across the full universe of 843 city rows with both data points, the typical change was +$5,650.
• The top decliners concentrate in Michigan (8 of the top 25), Florida (3 of the top 25), California (3 of the top 25).

Where the pattern sits geographically

Michigan (8 of the top 25), Florida (3 of the top 25), California (3 of the top 25) together account for the bulk of the top of this list. Click any city above to open its CensusEasy page, which carries the full historical time series for every metric we publish (income, education, housing, commute, race composition, industry mix), plus its rank within its state and its national percentile on each metric.

How to read this

This ranking is sorted by absolute change, not by percentage change. Absolute change is the figure that lines up with how readers experience these numbers in everyday life ("the typical household here earns $X more than in 1990"). The percentage-change framing surfaces a different set of city rows — usually places that started from a low base — and we publish those rankings separately on the rankings pages.

A single metric never tells the whole story. The largest decline on this list can reflect either change in the same population staying in place, or compositional change as some residents leave and others arrive. Companion studies on poverty, education, and housing cost together describe the fuller picture.

The pattern is concentrated in older industrial centers and in places that lost their dominant employer between 1990 and the late 2000s. We will publish a follow-up study breaking the same ranking by metro area, where the urban-suburban income gap reshapes the picture.