Table 1.
Prevalence of Financial Hardship During the First Year of the Pandemic, Overall and Stratified by Race/Ethnicity, COVID-19's Unequal Racial Burden Survey, December 2020–Februrary 2021
| Substantial hardship |
Some hardship |
A little hardship |
No hardship |
Any hardship |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N (%) | N (%) | N (%) | N (%) | N (%) | |
| Overall | 1170 (21.3) | 1503 (27.4) | 1188 (21.6) | 1634 (29.7) | 3861 (70.3) |
| Race/ethnicity | |||||
| American Indian/Alaska Native | 130 (25.9) | 151 (30.2) | 104 (20.7) | 116 (23.2) | 380 (76.1) |
| Asian | 121 (12.1) | 207 (20.7) | 258 (25.9) | 413 (41.4) | 586 (58.6) |
| Black/African American | 240 (24.0) | 294 (29.5) | 229 (22.9) | 245 (23.6) | 763 (76.4) |
| Latino | 293 (29.3) | 341 (34.1) | 169 (16.9) | 196 (19.6) | 801 (80.2) |
| English-speaking | 111 (22.4) | 143 (28.8) | 109 (22.1) | 132 (26.7) | 362 (73.0) |
| Spanish-speaking | 182 (36.2) | 198 (39.4) | 59 (11.7) | 64 (12.7) | 440 (87.3) |
| Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander | 152 (30.5) | 141 (28.4) | 100 (20.2) | 103 (20.8) | 393 (79.3) |
| White | 131 (13.1) | 225 (22.6) | 224 (22.4) | 419 (41.9) | 579 (58.0) |
| Multiracial | 104 (20.9) | 143 (28.7) | 102 (20.5) | 150 (29.9) | 350 (70.1) |
Financial hardship was measured by counting the number of hardship domains each participant reported experiencing (lost income, debt, unmet expenses, unmet health care expenses, housing insecurity, and food insecurity) during the first year of the pandemic and categorized into categories of substantial (4–6), some (2–3), little (1), and no (0) hardship experienced.