The official poverty rate, established in 1963, doesn't measure nearly all of that pandemic aid, so it did not decline sharply in 2020 and 2021, but also didn't shoot back up in 2022. Census Bureau Poverty rates using the official and Supplemental Poverty Measures for children. In North Carolina in 2022, there were 198,000 people aged 65 and older in poverty, slightly more than half the number of children in poverty.