WASHINGTON, March 28 (UPI) -- Per capita income -- the average income received by individuals -- grew 4.7 percent in 2004, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis said Monday.
The increase is more than double the 2.2 percent growth in the previous year,and the fastest pace since 2000 when per capita income grew 6.8 percent.
All states except South Dakota, Nebraska and Michigan enjoyed faster income growth.
The three states with the top income growth, North Dakota (8.6 percent), Iowa (7.8 percent) and South Dakota (6.9 percent), benefited from record or near-record production of corn, soybeans, and other crops, together with high crop prices.
Regionally, workers in financial services saw strong income growth in the Northeast (New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Delaware) and workers in construction saw strong income growth in the West (Colorado, Idaho, Oregon, Nevada, and Utah). Professional services workers saw income growth more broadly across the country.
Last-place Michigan owes its slow growth to the fact that income in the prior year was boosted by the large contribution automakers made to their workers' pension funds.
