What Salary Is Considered Poor in Texas?

In Texas, earning $15 an hour doesn’t buy you much more than a bus ticket and a sandwich. If you’re working full-time at that rate-40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year-you’ll make $31,200 before taxes. That sounds fine on paper. But try renting a one-bedroom apartment in Houston, Dallas, or Austin on that income. You won’t find one. Not even a dirty studio with a broken AC in a neighborhood you’d avoid after dark. The average rent for a one-bedroom in Texas’s biggest cities is now over $1,600 a month. That’s more than half your take-home pay before you pay for groceries, medicine, bus fare, or a phone bill.

How Texas Defines Poverty

The federal poverty line for a single person in 2025 is $14,580 a year. For a family of two adults and two children, it’s $30,000. These numbers haven’t kept up with reality. They were set in the 1960s based on food costs alone. Today, housing eats up 60% or more of a low-income household’s budget in Texas. The real poverty line? It’s closer to $25,000 for a single adult and $45,000 for a family of four. Anything below that? You’re not just poor-you’re one missed paycheck away from sleeping in your car or at a shelter.

Shelters in Texas are full. In Austin, the city’s largest shelter turned away 8,000 people last year because it had no space. In El Paso, the waitlist for emergency housing is 14 months long. People are sleeping in parks, under bridges, in 24-hour convenience stores. And many of them are working. One woman in San Antonio told a reporter she works two jobs-at a diner and a cleaning crew-and still can’t afford rent. She sleeps in her van. Her kids stay with her sister.

Minimum Wage Isn’t Enough

Texas still follows the federal minimum wage: $7.25 an hour. That’s been unchanged since 2009. Even if you work 60 hours a week at that rate, you’ll make just $22,464 a year. That’s below the federal poverty line for a family of two. And that’s assuming you don’t get sick, don’t need a car repair, and don’t have a child who needs glasses or medicine. Real life doesn’t work like that.

Some cities in Texas tried to raise the minimum wage locally. San Antonio passed a law in 2019 to gradually raise it to $15 by 2024. But the state legislature blocked it. Texas law doesn’t allow cities to set their own minimum wage higher than the state or federal level. So even if you live in a wealthy city like Austin, where Amazon and Google pay $100,000+ salaries, the person cleaning your office makes $7.25 an hour.

The Hidden Costs of Being Poor

Poverty isn’t just about low pay. It’s about being charged more for everything. If you don’t have a bank account, you pay to cash your paycheck at a check-cashing store-up to 5% per transaction. If you can’t afford a car, you spend hours on buses and pay for rideshares when you need to get to a job interview. If you can’t afford to buy food in bulk, you pay more per pound at corner stores. If you need to fix your car, you take out a payday loan with 400% interest. If you miss a payment on your phone bill, your service gets cut. No phone? No job.

One study from the University of Texas found that low-income families in Texas spend an extra $1,200 a year just because they’re poor. That’s called the poverty tax. It’s the cost of not having money to be smart with money.

Who’s Falling Through the Cracks

It’s not just the unemployed. It’s the working poor. The single mother who works as a home health aide and makes $12 an hour. The veteran who works nights at a warehouse but can’t afford the security deposit for an apartment. The teenager who dropped out of school to support their younger siblings. The elderly person on Social Security who can’t afford insulin and has to choose between medicine and food.

Even people with college degrees aren’t safe. A 2024 survey by the Texas Workforce Commission found that 22% of workers with a bachelor’s degree earned less than $30,000 a year. Many of them are teachers, childcare workers, and clerks. They’re not lazy. They’re not bad with money. They’re just stuck in jobs that don’t pay enough to live.

What ,000 a Year Really Buys in Texas

Let’s break down what $30,000 looks like in real life:

• Rent: $1,400/month = $16,800/year
• Utilities (electric, water, gas, internet): $250/month = $3,000/year
• Food: $400/month = $4,800/year
• Transportation (bus pass, gas, car insurance): $200/month = $2,400/year
• Healthcare (co-pays, prescriptions, dental): $150/month = $1,800/year
• Phone and basic necessities: $100/month = $1,200/year
• **Total: $30,000**

That’s it. No savings. No emergency fund. No vacation. No new clothes. No birthday presents. One flat tire, one broken appliance, one doctor’s visit that’s not covered-and you’re done. You’ll have to choose: pay the rent or buy the medicine. Eat this week or fix the car. Stay warm or pay the electric bill.

Shelters Aren’t a Solution

When people hit rock bottom, they go to shelters. But shelters aren’t safe, reliable, or long-term. They’re crowded. They have curfews. You can’t store your stuff. You can’t bring your pet. Many don’t allow couples. Some require you to attend religious services. Others turn people away if they’re on medication or have a criminal record-even if it was 20 years ago.

Shelters are temporary. They’re not housing. They’re not stability. They’re not dignity. And they’re always full. In 2025, Texas had 18,000 shelter beds for an estimated 110,000 homeless people on any given night. That’s one bed for every six people. The rest sleep outside.

Why This Isn’t Getting Fixed

Texas has the largest economy of any state in the U.S. It’s growing fast. New people move here every day. But the state refuses to raise the minimum wage, cut housing costs, or invest in affordable housing. Politicians say, “People should work harder.” But the people working hardest are the ones sleeping in their cars.

There’s no shortage of money. There’s a shortage of will. Texas spends $1.2 billion a year on prisons. It spends $1.8 billion on highway expansions. But only $320 million on affordable housing. That’s less than one-tenth of what’s needed.

What Can Be Done

It’s not hopeless. Cities like Austin and Dallas have started pilot programs to give direct cash payments to homeless families. In one program, 80% of participants found stable housing within six months. Another program in Fort Worth gave low-income workers $500 a month for a year. Their rent payments went up. Their mental health improved. Their kids did better in school. And most kept their jobs.

States like California and New York are passing laws to cap rent increases and fund new affordable housing. Texas could do the same. But it won’t unless people speak up. Until then, the people earning $12, $15, $18 an hour? They’re not just poor. They’re invisible.

What You Can Do

If you live in Texas and you’re wondering what salary is considered poor-ask yourself this: Would you survive on $15 an hour? If the answer is no, then you already know the truth. You don’t need a statistic to tell you that. You just need to look around.

Volunteer at a shelter. Donate to a food bank. Support local housing initiatives. Vote for leaders who say they’ll fix this. Don’t wait for someone else to act. The system isn’t broken. It was built this way. And it can be changed-if enough people demand it.

Final Thoughts

There’s no mystery here. If you work 40 hours a week and still can’t afford a roof over your head, the system is failing. Texas doesn’t lack resources. It lacks the political will to treat people like human beings, not line items on a budget. The salary that’s considered poor isn’t just a number. It’s a mother choosing between insulin and rent. It’s a veteran sleeping under a bridge because the VA waitlist is too long. It’s a teenager skipping meals so their sibling can eat.

Fixing this isn’t about charity. It’s about justice. And justice doesn’t wait. It demands action.