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About 14% of Washington residents carry delinquent debt, lower than the national average of 22%, according to a recent analysis by the Urban Institute.
Among people of color, that rate of past-due or unpaid debt on car or student loans, credit cards and medical bills rises to 17% in Washington and 29% nationwide, compared to 13% for white Washington residents and 19% for white communities nationwide.
However, the median amount of delinquent debt Washington residents have is slightly higher than the national average, at $2,294 compared to $2,123. White residents also carry about $100 more in debt than residents of color in Washington, a trend that’s reversed nationwide.
Only 1% of Washington residents hold delinquent medical debt, opposed to 5% of the nation. Thirteen percent of Washington residents have past-due student loan debt and 3% carry auto or retail loan debt, rates that are both 2% lower than the national average.
Young adults in Washington also have less past-due debt than the national average for young adults. Both Washington’s young adults and the nation’s are less likely to have unpaid debt than older adults.
Delinquency can lead to high fees, increased interest rates, poor credit scores and more, hurting a person’s ability to access car and home loans, rent apartments and pay for other living expenses.
The analysis from the public policy think tank uses August 2023 credit bureau data and Census estimates from 2018 to 2022. In its definition of delinquent debt, it includes unpaid bills in collections and past-due credit lines that have been closed and charged off.
That definition may obscure the true levels of debt Washington residents face, said Sam Hatzenbeler, a policy associate at Economic Opportunity Institute, a progressive non-profit group based in Seattle. Medical debt, for example, can come from other sources, like needing to go on a payment plan with a hospital or getting a loan from a friend.
A Kaiser Family Foundation report with a broader definition of medical debt using 2019-2021 data found 6.5% of Washington residents have medical debt — but that number was still comparatively better than the national average in the same report.
Hatzenbeler said Washington may be doing better compared to the rest of the nation due to policy changes to improve affordability of needed services, like expanding Medicaid. But she said that doesn’t mean there isn’t still an “affordability crisis” in Washington.
The interactive dashboard reveals county-level rates of delinquent debt as well, showing that rates of debt in all of Washington’s 39 counties are lower than the national average.
Yakima County and Asotin County have the highest rate of debt at 20%. In Yakima County, 23% of the county’s residents of color are carrying delinquent debt as opposed to 14% of white people. Data for communities of color in Asotin County is unavailable.
The lowest rate of debt is in Kittitas County, at 10%.
Disparities for communities of color in Washington are most apparent in the state’s most populous counties, with Pierce County being the worst: 29% of the county’s residents of color have delinquent debt, compared to 16% of the county’s white residents. In King County, 8% of white residents have delinquent debt, compared to 15% of residents of color.