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56-589: Historically, there have been several attempts at answering who exactly is the average American. For example, the Saturday Evening Post and The Washington Post have attempted to answer the question. Both articles agreed that the average American is a white Christian female, who is part of a couple, and is politically independent. Admittedly, there are problems with this answer. In 2001, for example, no single household arrangement constituted more than 30% of total households. Married couples with no children were

112-507: A Half Men ) and Homer Simpson ( The Simpsons ). In the film Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story , the protagonist , Peter, owns a gym for those who do not want an intensive workout, and the patrons of the gym are all somewhat overweight. The gym is named Average Joe's Gymnasium. In real life, as chronicled in his bestseller The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen, Kevin O'Keefe successfully completed

168-419: A college degree, including an Associate degree . While only a minority of Americans, 35%, have graduated from college with a Bachelor's degree or more, a majority, 61%, of Americans had "some college" education. Also, 45% had an associate degree or more, with only roughly 13.7% having a graduate degree . On the other end of the strata, 10% of adults did not graduate from high school. It is fair to assume that

224-401: A damn good vehicle for advertising" with competitive renewal rates and readership reports and expressed what The New York Times called "understandable bitterness" in wishing "that all the one-eyed critics will lose their other eye". Otto Friedrich , the magazine's last managing editor, blamed the death of The Post on Curtis. In his Decline and Fall (Harper & Row, 1970), an account of

280-519: A game between the University of Alabama and the University of Georgia . Both coaches sued Curtis Publishing Co. for defamation, each initially asking for $ 10 million. Bryant eventually settled for $ 300,000 while Butts' case went to the Supreme Court , which held that libel damages may be recoverable (in this instance against a news organization) when the injured party is a non-public official, if

336-416: A high degree of autonomy in the workplace . The American economy, however, does not require a labor force consisting solely of professionals . Instead it requires a greatly diverse and specialized labor force. Thus the majority of Americans complete assigned tasks with considerably less autonomy and creative freedom than professionals , leading to theory that they may better be described as being members of

392-479: A housing unit in the US was $ 167,500 in 2005 with the median mortgage payment being $ 1,295. The average size of a household was 2.5 persons with almost all housing units, 97%, having 1 or fewer occupants per room. However, the term "room" does not exclusively refer to bedrooms, but includes the kitchen, dining room, family room, bathrooms and any other rooms a house might have. While 85% of American homes had 3 or fewer bedrooms,

448-464: A letter column, poetry with contributions submitted by readers, single-panel gag cartoons , including Hazel by Ted Key , and stories by leading writers of the time. It was known for commissioning lavish illustrations and original works of fiction. Illustrations were featured on the cover and embedded in stories and advertising. Some Post illustrations continue to be reproduced as posters or prints, especially those by Norman Rockwell . In 1929, at

504-654: A married couple with their own children is often seen as the average American family, such households constitute less than a quarter of all households. Married couples without children are currently the plurality constituting 28.7% of households, compared to 24.1% for nuclear families. Another 25.5% of households consisted of single persons residing alone. Recent trends have shown the numbers of nuclear families as well as childless married couples decrease. In 1970, 40.3% of US households consisted of nuclear families with childless couples making up 30.3% of households and 10.6% of households being arranged in "Other family types." By 2000

560-485: A married couple. Current trends indicate that people in the US are marrying later and less often with higher divorce rates. Despite the declining prevalence of marriage, more than three-quarters of Americans will marry at least once in their lifetime. The average age for marriage for a male was 26.8 and 25.1 for a female. Americans are also likely to remarry after their first divorce. In 1990, 40% of all marriages were remarriages. All together one can conclude that while there

616-904: A mortgage". Homeownership is the primary asset most Americans use to generate wealth. For majority of U.S. homeowners, their home equity represents 50-70% of their net wealth. In first quarter 2023, the average American with an active mortgage had a home equity close to US$ 275,000. According to US Department of Commerce data in 2005, 67% of housing units in the United States were owner occupied , had three or fewer bedrooms with one or less occupant per room (including kitchen, dining room, living room, etc.) and were mortgaged. The overwhelming majority, 85%, of all housing units had three or fewer bedrooms. The plurality of housing units, 40%, had three bedrooms. The majority, 67%, of housing units were mortgaged with 52% of households spending 25% or less of their annual income on mortgage payments. The median value of

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672-477: A nationwide search for the person who was the most statistically average in the United States during a multi-year span starting in 2000. Newsweek proclaimed of the book, "The journey toward run-of-the-mill has never been so remarkable." As the United States is a highly diverse nation, it should not be surprising that there is no single prevalent household arrangement. While the " nuclear family " consisting of

728-418: A nuclear 4-person family. The nuclear family ... is the idealized version of what most people think of when they think of "family   ..." The old definition of what a family is ... the nuclear family- no longer seems adequate to cover the wide diversity of household arrangements we see today, according to many social scientists (Edwards 1991; Stacey 1996). Thus has arisen the term postmodern family , which

784-564: A result, the Post published more articles on current events and cut costs by replacing illustrations with photographs for covers and advertisements. In 1967, The magazine's publisher, Curtis Publishing Company , lost a landmark defamation suit, Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts 388 U.S. 130 (1967), resulting from an article, and was ordered to pay $ 3,060,000 in damages to the plaintiff . The Post article implied that football coaches Paul "Bear" Bryant and Wally Butts conspired to fix

840-1013: A serial appearing in successive issues. Most of the fiction was written for mainstream tastes by popular writers, but some literary writers were featured. The opening pages of stories featured paintings by the leading magazine illustrators. The Post published stories and essays by H. E. Bates , Ray Bradbury , Kay Boyle , Agatha Christie , Brian Cleeve , Eleanor Franklin Egan , William Faulkner , F. Scott Fitzgerald , C. S. Forester , Ernest Haycox , Robert A. Heinlein , Kurt Vonnegut , Paul Gallico , Normand Poirier , Hammond Innes , Louis L'Amour , Sinclair Lewis , Joseph C. Lincoln , John P. Marquand , Edgar Allan Poe , Mary Roberts Rinehart , Sax Rohmer , William Saroyan , John Steinbeck , Rex Stout , Rob Wagner , Edith Wharton , and P.G. Wodehouse . Poetry published came from poets including: Carl Sandburg , Ogden Nash , Dorothy Parker , and Hannah Kahn . Jack London 's best-known novel The Call of

896-588: A year by the Saturday Evening Post Society, which claims 501(c)(3) non-profit organization status. With the January/February 2013 issue, the Post launched a major makeover of the publication, including a new cover design and efforts to increase the magazine's profile, in response to a general public misbelief that it was no longer in existence. The magazine's new logo is an update of a logo it had used beginning in 1942. As of October 2018,

952-589: A year by the Saturday Evening Post Society, which purchased the magazine in 1982. The magazine was redesigned in 2013. The Saturday Evening Post was first published in 1821 in the same printing shop at 53 Market Street in Philadelphia , where the Benjamin Franklin -founded Pennsylvania Gazette was published in the 18th century. While the Gazette ceased publication in 1800, ten years after Franklin's death,

1008-430: Is meant to describe the great variability in family forms, including single-parent families and child-free couples. A statement that can be made, however, is that most Americans will marry at least once in their lifetime with the first marriage most commonly ending in divorce. Today a little over half (52.3%) of US household include a married couple, showing a significant decrease since 1970 when 70.6% of households included

1064-425: Is no prevalent average household arrangement, most Americans (the average Joe) will get married and divorced once with a considerable number of Americans remarrying at least once. Income in the United States is most commonly measured either by individual or household . By only including those above age 25, the vast majority of students and all working adolescents are excluded. The average American, as discussed in

1120-553: The Congressional Budget Office compile reports on income statistics. The primary classifications are by household or individual . The top quintile in personal income in 2019 was $ 103,012 (included in the chart below). The differences between household and personal income are considerable, since 61% of households now have two or more income earners. Median personal income in 2020 was $ 56,287 for full-time workers. This difference becomes very apparent when comparing

1176-637: The New Deal . Garrett accused the Roosevelt administration of initiating socialist strategies. After Lorimer died, Garrett became editorial writer-in-chief and criticized the Roosevelt administration's support of the United Kingdom and efforts to prepare to enter World War II , and allegedly showed some support for Adolf Hitler in some of his editorials. Garrett's positions aroused controversy and may have cost

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1232-663: The Post links its history to the original magazine. Cyrus H. K. Curtis , publisher of the Ladies' Home Journal , bought the Post for $ 1,000 in 1897. Under the ownership of the Curtis Publishing Company , the Post grew to become the most widely circulated weekly magazine in the United States. The magazine gained prominent status under the leadership of its longtime editor George Horace Lorimer (1899–1937). The Saturday Evening Post published current event articles, editorials, human interest pieces, humor, illustrations,

1288-665: The Post readers and advertisers in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor and the Holocaust . (Listed from the purchase by Curtis, 1898) Income in the United States Income in the United States is measured by the various federal agencies including the Internal Revenue Service , Bureau of Labor Statistics , US Department of Commerce , and the US Census Bureau . Additionally, various agencies, including

1344-510: The Post , Rockwell painted more than 300 covers. The Post also employed Nebraska artist John Philip Falter , who became known as "a painter of Americana with an accent of the Middle West ," who "brought out some of the homeliness and humor of Middle Western town life and home life." He produced 120 covers for the Post between 1943 and 1968, ceasing only when the magazine began displaying photographs on its covers. Another prominent artist

1400-523: The Post' s advertisers. Columnist Art Buchwald lampooned the decision, suggesting that "if the Saturday Evening Post considered you a deadbeat, you didn't have much choice but to either pretend you were still getting the magazine and live a lie, or move out of the neighborhood before anyone found out." These last-ditch efforts failed to save the magazine, and Curtis announced in January 1969 that

1456-505: The professional and professional support fields having a bachelor's degree or higher, compared to only 31.6% of those employed in sales and 11.6% of those in the service sector. The average American does not have a bachelor's degree, and is most likely employed in the tertiary sector of the economy , encompassing both non-professional white-collar and pink-collar work. Altogether the American economy and labor force have changed greatly since

1512-405: The American middle class, with fiction, non-fiction, cartoons and features that reached two million homes every week. In the 1960s, the magazine's readership began to decline. In 1969, The Saturday Evening Post folded for two years before being revived as a quarterly publication with an emphasis on medical articles in 1971. As of the late 2000s, The Saturday Evening Post is published six times

1568-487: The February 8 issue would be the magazine's last. Ackerman stated that the magazine had lost $ 5M in 1968 and would lose a projected $ 3M in 1969. In a meeting with employees after the magazine's closure had been announced, Emerson thanked the staff for their professional work and promised "to stay here and see that everyone finds a job". At a March 1969 post-mortem on the magazine's closing, Emerson stated that The Post "was

1624-477: The Wild was first published, in serialized form, in the Saturday Evening Post in 1903. Emblematic of the Post's fiction was author Clarence Budington Kelland , who first appeared in 1916–17 with stories of homespun heroes, "Efficiency Edgar" and "Scattergood Baines". Kelland was a steady presence from 1922 until 1961. For many years William Hazlett Upson contributed a very popular series of short stories about

1680-399: The average Joe/Jane is not a college graduate, but is a high school graduate. However, it is difficult to determine how much college education the average American has, as the population is split between those who graduated, attended but did not graduate, and did not attend college. Over the past half century the educational attainment of the US population has significantly increased. In 2019,

1736-483: The beginning of the Mexican Repatriation , The Saturday Evening Post ran a series on the racial inferiority of Mexicans. In 1954, it published its first articles on the role of the U.S. in deposing Mohammad Mosaddegh , Prime Minister of Iran , in 1953. The article was based on materials leaked by CIA director Allen Dulles . The Post readership began to decline in the late 1950s and 1960s. In general,

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1792-450: The complete archive of the magazine is available online. In 1916, Saturday Evening Post editor George Horace Lorimer discovered Norman Rockwell , then an unknown 22-year-old New York City artist. Lorimer promptly purchased two illustrations from Rockwell, using them as covers, and commissioned three more drawings. Rockwell's illustrations of the American family and rural life of a bygone era became icons. During his 50-year career with

1848-445: The decline of general interest magazines was blamed on television, which competed for advertisers and readers' attention. The Post had problems retaining readers: the public's taste in fiction was changing, and the Post ' s conservative politics and values appealed to a declining number of people. Content by popular writers became harder to obtain. Prominent authors drifted away to newer magazines offering more money and status. As

1904-414: The educational attainment section, is a high school graduate who attended but did not graduate from college. From the below table in 2017, the median personal income of such Americans was $ 37,968, and among those who worked full-time their median personal income was $ 43,377. Source: US Census Bureau, 2021 The US adult population seems almost equally divided between those who have and those who don't have

1960-416: The escapades of Earthworm Tractors salesman Alexander Botts. Publication in the Post launched careers and helped established artists and writers stay afloat. P. G. Wodehouse said "the wolf was always at the door" until the Post gave him his "first break" in 1915 by serializing Something New . After the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt , Post columnist Garet Garrett became a vocal critic of

2016-402: The late 1960s and early 1970s. However, the taken income is slightly above average. Saturday Evening Post The Saturday Evening Post is an American magazine , currently published six times a year. It was published weekly from 1897 until 1963, and then every other week until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely circulated and influential magazines among

2072-671: The late 1970s. Household income, however, has risen due to the increasing number of households with more than one income earner and women's increased presence in the labor force . Note: The minimums in the table are minimums neither for household nor for individual incomes, but rather for the Adjusted Gross Incomes from individual tax returns, excluding returns from dependents (persons who can be claimed as dependents on another person's or couple's tax return). Since these returns include those that are for married couples filing jointly, some of them will have incomes that are greater than

2128-499: The magazine still in dire financial straits, Ackerman announced that Curtis would reduce printing costs by cancelling the subscriptions of roughly half of its readers. Those who lost their subscriptions were offered a free transfer to a subscription to Life magazine; Life publisher Time Inc. paid Curtis $ 5M for the exchange, easing the company's mounting debts. The move was also widely seen as an opportunity for Curtis to abandon older and more rural readers, who were less valuable to

2184-412: The magazine was later transferred to the Saturday Evening Post Society; SerVaas headed both organizations. The range of topics covered in the magazine's articles is now wide, suitable for a general readership. By 1991, Curtis Publishing Company had been renamed Curtis International, a subsidiary of SerVaas Inc., and had become an importer of audiovisual equipment. Today the Post is published six times

2240-408: The magazine's final years (1962–69), he argued that corporate management was unimaginative and incompetent. Friedrich acknowledges that The Post faced challenges while the tastes of American readers changed over the course of the 1960s, but he insisted that the magazine maintained a standard of good quality and was appreciated by readers. In 1970, control of the debilitated Curtis Publishing Company

2296-610: The median income, other characteristics, such as family arrangements, may not be identified as being average. In terms of social class , the average American may be described as either being middle class , or working class . As social classes lack distinct boundaries the average American may have a status in the area where the lower middle and upper working class overlap. "Average Joes" are common fodder for characters in television or movies , comics , novels , or radio dramas . On television, examples of "average Joes" include Doug Heffernan ( King of Queens ), Alan Harper ( Two and

Average Joe - Misplaced Pages Continue

2352-523: The median number of total rooms per housing units was 5.3 in 2005. These statistics suggest that the average Americans reside in their own home , and pay roughly $ 1,000 per month in mortgage payments for a three or fewer bedroom house with no more than one occupant per room. US Census Bureau data from 2002 identified housing characteristics for owner-occupied units inhabited by households with average incomes, ranging from $ 40,000 to $ 60,000. The median square footage for homes occupied by middle-income households

2408-405: The median personal income for American adults age 25+ was $ 46,985 overall, specifically $ 52,297 for males and $ 40,294 for females. In terms of social class the average American could be referred to as being both a member of the middle or working class . The discrepancy is largely the result of differing class models and definitions of what constitutes a member of the middle class . Currently

2464-451: The middle of the 20th century, with most workers today no longer being employed in blue-collar occupations. The majority of American households are "homeowners" but likely owe on a mortgage, as the term also includes households that owe on a mortgage . According to ATTOM Data Research, only "34 percent of all American homeowners have 100 percent equity in their properties — they've either paid off their entire mortgage debt or they never had

2520-497: The most common constituting 28.7% of households. It would nonetheless be inaccurate to state that the average American lives in a childless couple arrangement as 71.3% do not. Today, statistics by the United States Department of Commerce provide information regarding the societal attributes of those who may be referred to as being "average". While some individual attributes are easily identified as being average, such as

2576-422: The nuclear family as the average American household, neither can one identify the current plurality of married couples without children as "the average." Recent statistics indeed indicate that there is no average American family arrangement, but that American society is home to a wide and diverse variety of family arrangements. The one thing the data does indicate is that the average Joe most likely does not reside in

2632-410: The percentage of households with six figure incomes to that of individuals. Overall, including all households/individuals regardless of employment status, the median household income was $ 67,521 in 2020 while the median personal income (including individuals aged 15 and over) was $ 35,805. While wages for women have increased greatly, median earnings of male wage earners have remained stagnant since

2688-507: The percentage of nuclear families had decreased by 40%, while the number of other family types had increased by 51%. The percentage of single households has also steadily increased. In 1970, only 17% of households consisted of singles. In 2000 that figure had increased by 50% with singles constituting 25.5% of households. The most drastic increase was among the percentage of households made up of single males, which nearly doubled from 5.6% in 1970 to 10.7% in 2000. Today, one can no longer refer to

2744-490: The plaintiff can prove that the defendant was guilty of a reckless lack of professional standards when examining allegations for reasonable credibility. (Butts was eventually awarded $ 460,000.) William Emerson was promoted to editor-in-chief in 1965 and remained in the position until the magazine's demise in 1969. In 1968, Martin Ackerman , a specialist in troubled firms, became president of Curtis after lending it $ 5M. With

2800-499: The top of the wage scale the phrase connotes a certain Regular Joe cachet. But this eagerness to be part of the group has led the definition to be stretched like a bungee cord. Occupational autonomy is a key factor in regards to class positions. Professionals and managers who are exclusively labeled as middle class , and often as upper middle class , conceptualize, create and consult in their jobs. Due to their great expertise they enjoy

2856-405: The vast majority of Americans self-identify as middle class , yet some experts in the field such as Michael Zweig of Stony Brook University or Dennis Gilbert of Cornell University have brought forth different theories. The majority of American adults are neither professionals nor managers and lack college degrees . Everyone wants to believe they are middle class. For people on the bottom and

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2912-490: The working class. The plurality of Americans (41%) today are white-collar salaried employees who work in varied environments, including offices and at home. Roughly 25% of Americans were employed in the traditional blue-collar fields that involve physical labor. And 34% of Americans are employed in the service industry, including about one-third in the healthcare industry (11% of the total). Educational attainment varied greatly depending on occupational field with 68% of those in

2968-814: Was Charles R. Chickering , a freelance illustrator who went on to design numerous postage stamps for the U.S. Post Office. Other popular cover illustrators include artists George Hughes, Constantin Alajalov , John Clymer , Alonzo Kimball , W. H. D. Koerner , J. C. Leyendecker , Mead Schaeffer , Charles Archibald MacLellan , John E. Sheridan , Emmett Watson , Douglass Crockwell , and N. C. Wyeth . Cartoonists have included: Irwin Caplan , Clyde Lamb , Jerry Marcus , Frank O'Neal , Charles M. Schulz , and Bill Yates . The magazine ran Ted Key 's cartoon panel series Hazel from 1943 to 1969. Each issue featured several original short stories and often included an installment of

3024-416: Was 1,700 with 52% of such homes having two or more bathrooms. The median value of these homes was $ 112,000 with the median year of construction being 1970. Middle-income households tended to spend roughly 18% of their monthly income on housing. Thus it is likely that many average Americans reside in 1,700-square-foot (160 m) homes, priced slightly above $ 100,000 with two or more bathrooms that were built in

3080-502: Was acquired from the estate of Cyrus Curtis by Indianapolis industrialist Beurt SerVaas . SerVaas relaunched the Post the following year on a quarterly basis as a kind of nostalgia magazine. In early 1982, ownership of the Post was transferred to the Benjamin Franklin Literary and Medical Society, founded in 1976 by the Post' s then-editor, Corena "Cory" SerVaas (wife of Beurt SerVaas). The magazine's core focus

3136-487: Was now health and medicine; indeed, the magazine's website originally noted that the "credibility of The Saturday Evening Post has made it a valuable asset for reaching medical consumers and for helping medical researchers obtain family histories. In the magazine, national health surveys are taken to further current research on topics such as cancer , diabetes , high blood pressure , heart disease , ulcerative colitis , spina bifida , and bipolar disorder ." Ownership of

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