U.S. households’ inflation-adjusted incomes rose last year for the first time since 2019, yet they still have not fully recovered to pre-pandemic levels.

The median income increased 4% last year to $80,610, according to the Census Bureau’s annual report on income, poverty and health insurance coverage. The gain reflected a moderation in inflation that in 2022 reached a four-decade high. Even so, median incomes were $600 below where they were four years earlier.

While price pressures have moderated, the costs of everything from grocery items to housing and car insurance are much higher than they were before the pandemic. That helps explain why many Americans felt like the economy was in a recession last year, and the economy has been a top issue during the presidential election campaign.

The report shows a divergence by race and gender. White households saw an increase in income, while Black, Asian and Hispanic families saw no significant change.

And real median earnings for full-time, year-round working women, regardless of their ethnicity, rose at half the pace of men’s, reversing recent trends. This is the first statistically significant drop in the female-to-male earnings ratio in two decades.

U.S. inflation reaches a 3-year low, according to recent data

The post-pandemic spike in U.S. inflation eased further last month as year-over-year price increases reached a three-year low, clearing the way for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates and likely shaping the economic debate in the final weeks of the presidential race.

Wednesday’s report from the Labor Department showed that consumer prices rose 2.5% in August from a year earlier, down from 2.9% in July. It was the fifth straight annual drop and the smallest since February 2021. From July to August, prices rose just 0.2%.

Excluding volatile food and energy costs, so-called core prices rose 3.2% in August from a year ago, the same as in July. On a month-to-month basis, core prices rose 0.3% last month, a slight pickup from July’s 0.2% increase. Economists closely watch core prices, which typically provide a better read of future inflation trends.

“Today’s report will add to confidence within the Fed that inflation is indeed on a sustainable path towards 2%,” the Fed’s target level, Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics, wrote in a note to clients.

A key reason for last month’s drop in overall inflation was the third drop in gas prices in the past four months: Average gas prices fell 0.6% from July to August and are down 10.6% from a year ago. And used cars fell 1% last month.

TD Bank to pay $28 million for sharing flawed consumer data

Toronto-Dominion Bank will pay almost $28 million in fines and restitution after the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said the lender shared inaccurate information about tens of thousands of US customers with consumer reporting companies.

A CFPB investigation found the information included personal bankruptcies and credit card delinquencies as well as bank accounts that “TD Bank knew or suspected were fraudulently opened,” the agency said in a statement Wednesday. “After the bank realized it was botching its reporting to consumer reporting companies, it took far too long to correct many of its errors.”

The information TD shared was for a range of consumer reports, including job and tenant screening and other background reports, the types of data that can affect consumers’ employment prospects, access to credit and ability to secure housing, according to the CFPB.

Bank of America Corp. raises minimum hourly wage to $24

Bank of America Corp. will increase its minimum hourly wage to $24 next month, taking the next step toward a goal of paying $25 by 2025 that it set seven years ago.

The move bumps pay up from $23, a level the firm put in place last September, the company said Tuesday. It translates to a full-time annualized salary of about $50,000 and applies to all full-time and part-time hourly positions in the US. The change continues a series of hikes lifting the firm’s base pay from $15 in 2017.

If Bank of America hits its target for 2025, its minimum hourly wage will have climbed by almost $14, or more than 121%, since 2010, according to the firm.

Compiled from Bloomberg and Associated Press reports.