October 1, 2026

Nevada's poverty rate is mostly Clark County's rate

By Adelle Wood · 3 minute read

Nevada has 17 county areas: 16 counties and Carson City, which public data counts as a county of its own. Clark County holds 2,293,764 of the state's 3,141,000 residents, or 73.0 per cent. According to the American Community Survey, the Census Bureau's annual household survey, it also holds 76.6 per cent of Nevadans living below the poverty line, about 303,000 of roughly 395,000. Outside the District of Columbia, no state has more of its people, or more of its residents in poverty, in a single county.

So when a report quotes Nevada's poverty rate, 12.6 per cent, it is mostly quoting Clark County. Clark reports 13.2 per cent. The other 16 areas together report 10.9 per cent, and the median Nevada county reports 11.0 per cent.

Clark County sits on the national middle

The middle county of the 3,142 in the 50 states and DC reports 13.2 per cent poverty. Clark County, the 12th largest county in the country, reports the same figure to one decimal place. Ranked from the highest rate down, it comes 1,574th of 3,142, within a few places of the exact middle.

That needs reading with care. A survey estimate carries a margin of error, so the honest reading is that Clark sits on the national middle, not a fraction either side of it. How the survey's figures are built into a population, and where their limits are, is set out in the methodology.

Where Clark differs from the rest of Nevada

The poverty gap between Clark and the rest of the state is modest, 2.3 points. Other differences are wider, and they are the ones a single state figure blurs.

Born abroad: 21.7 per cent of Clark residents, against 11.5 per cent across the rest of the state. It is the highest share of any Nevada county.
Language other than English at home: 33.3 per cent, also the highest in the state, against a median Nevada county of 12.0 per cent.
Owner-occupied homes: 57.0 per cent, against a median Nevada county of 73.7 per cent. Only Esmeralda County is lower.
Households spending 30 per cent or more of income on housing: 36.9 per cent, second only to Esmeralda County, against a median Nevada county of 25.7 per cent.
Median gross rent: $1,518 a month, second to Douglas County at $1,545, against a national county middle of $854.
Aged 65 and over: 15.6 per cent, against 19.5 per cent across the rest of the state.

The counties the state figure leaves out

The 16 other areas hold 847,236 people. Washoe County holds most of them: 491,770 residents at 10.7 per cent poverty, on a median household income of $85,600 against Clark's $73,845. Clark and Washoe together are 88.7 per cent of the state. The remaining 15 areas hold 355,466 people, 11.3 per cent, and their rates spread far wider than the two large counties.

The highest rates in the state:

Eureka County, 22.1 per cent, with 1,660 residents.
Esmeralda County, 19.4 per cent, with 962 residents.
Mineral County, 18.0 per cent, on the lowest median household income in the state, $50,584. 27.0 per cent of residents are 65 or over.
Nye County, 15.5 per cent, with 53,207 residents, 31.0 per cent of them aged 65 or over. 80.8 per cent of households have a broadband subscription, against 90.5 per cent in Clark.

At the other end, Lincoln County reports 6.6 per cent and Storey County 7.1 per cent. Douglas County reports 8.3 per cent on $88,018, with the highest income per person in the state, $52,915, and 31.6 per cent of residents aged 65 or over. Eureka and Esmeralda each have fewer than 2,000 residents, so their rates rest on small samples. Read them as high, not as exact.

What this changes for a plan

In most states a state figure is an average of many places. In Nevada it is largely one place. That is fine for a plan aimed at Clark County, which the state figure describes well. It is a poor guide to the other 16 areas, where rates run from 6.6 per cent to 22.1 per cent and residents are older. A plan for anywhere outside Clark needs a county read, and that kind of place-based analysis is what these figures are for.

Cambium AI builds synthetic populations from this same public data, so a research or marketing team can hold Clark, Washoe and the 15 smaller areas side by side before a budget is set.

Data source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (ACS) 5-Year Estimates