There are some appliances that are commonplace
in the home regardless of income level. These appliances are refrigerators,
cooking appliances (which includes the standard oven with stove-top burners,
separate stove and ovens, and toaster ovens), and color televisions.
The percent of households that have them are as follows:
- Refrigerator 99.9%
- Cooking appliance 99.7%
- Color television 98.9%
Source: Energy Information Administration;
2001 Residential Energy Consumption Survey.
For many other home
appliances, presence vary by income level. Having more income in a household usually equates with
more spending power. As a result, households with more income will usually
have appliances that some may consider a luxury or unnecessary item that
they can do without. For some appliances that appear in the majority
of households, the economic differences are apparent in quality, size,
quantity, or high-tech features that come with the appliance.
Home Entertainment
Having home entertainment
is important to many households. As mentioned previously, about 99 percent
of the households have a color television. Even in the lowest income
bracket, more than half the households have cable or satellite television,
a stereo system, or a VCR. Large screen televisions are the only item
that does not exceed 50 percent for the lowest income level. One possible
factor is that in the 2001 RECS survey, the question about having a large
screen television is a qualitative yes or no question based on the opinion
of the respondent and not a quantitative question that asked for a measurement
of the television screen size.
Large Screen Televisions
In
Figure 2, the percent of households with a large screen television increased
from about 25 percent for the lowest income bracket to 43 percent for
the highest income bracket.
Cable or Satellite System
The 2001
RECS survey also shows an increase by income in whether the televisions
are connected to a cable or satellite system (Figure 3). Even for the
lowest income bracket, the percent of households with cable or satellite
television is 64 percent. This increases to 87 percent for the highest
income level.
Video Cassette Recorders (VCR)
Figure
4 illustrates that when a household’s income is in the lowest bracket,
26 percent of the households do not have a VCR, and an almost equal percentage
of households (21 percent) have two VCR’s. As household income increases,
the number of households with more than one VCR increases from 21 percent
to 62 percent. At the same time, the percent of households without a
VCR decreases from 26 percent down to 4 percent.
Stereo
Systems
Another
part of a household’s home entertainment area is a stereo system. In
the RECS, stereo systems include portable stereo systems (commonly referred
to as boom boxes), component stereo systems, and compact stereo systems,
but not headset radios or kitchen/clock radios. In the lowest income level,
54 percent of the housing units have a stereo. The percentage increases
to 90 percent in the highest income category (Figure 5).
Cell Phones and Answering Machines
Being able
to communicate with others at any time and place is becoming more important
in our society. Ways to accomplish this are through pagers, email, cell
phones, and answering machines. Cell phones and answering machines are
more commonplace as household income increases.
In Figure
6, as income increases, percent of households with cell phones increases
from 23 percent to 82 percent. In Figure 7, answering machines in the
home increase from 37 percent for the lowest income levels up to 76 percent
at the highest income level. At the higher income levels, the percentage
appears to flatten off. Excluded from the answering machine statistic
is the percent of households that use a voice mail service on either the
regular phone line or on a cell phone instead of having an answering machine.
If a household has a cell phone and an answering machine (Figure 8), an
interesting pattern in the data occurs. Having both increases with income,
and having neither item decreases with income. Above an income level
of $75,000, only 5 percent of the households do not have either a cell
phone or an answering machine.
Clothes Washers and Dryers
Two items most households eventually
would like to own are clothes washers and dryers. In Figure 9, the percent
of housing units with clothes washers increases from 57 percent for the
lowest income level to 94 percent for the highest income level. For clothes
dryers (Figure 10), the percent of households is 45 percent for the lowest
income level and about doubles to 92 percent for the highest income level.
The percent of households that have a clothes washer and a clothes dryer
increases from 45 percent for the lowest income level to 92 percent for
the highest income level (Figure 11). These percentages are identical
to the percentages of households that have only a clothes dryer. The
reason for this is because the percentage of housing units that have a
clothes dryer and not a clothes washer are less than one percent. Also
in Figure 11, there is a small percentage of housing units, which decreases
with increasing income level, that have a clothes washer but do not have
a clothes dryer.
Having both a washer and dryer is also related to the type of housing
unit the respondent lives in. In Figure 12, the highest percentage having
both is in single-family, detached homes, with 91 percent. The lowest
percentage is in large apartment buildings (5 or more rental units) where
only 19 percent have both a washer and a dryer.
Kitchen Appliances
Dishwashers and Refrigerators
One major
home appliance that is not found in all households and traditionally occurs
more frequently in higher income households is a dishwasher. In Figure
13, the percent of households with dishwashers increases from 18 percent
for the lowest income level to 83 percent for the highest income level.
While almost every household has a refrigerator, the differences are in
the quantity, size, and if it has an ice/water dispenser. In Figure 14,
the percent of housing units with two or more refrigerators increases
from 6 percent to 31 percent as income level increases. Between 85 and
90 percent of the housing units have either a medium size (15-18 cubic
feet) or large size (19-22 cubic feet) refrigerator. For household incomes
above $15,000, almost an inverse relationship between medium and large
sizes occur. As income increases, the percent of households with large
size refrigerators also increases. At the same time, the percent of households
with medium size refrigerators decreases Figure 15). The percent of households
that have refrigerators with an ice/water dispenser increases from 6 percent
to 40 percent as the household income increases Figure 16).
Separate Freezers
For
households with separate freezers, the pattern does not follow income,
but instead where the housing unit is located geographically by Census
division and whether the housing unit is in a city, a town, a suburb,
or in a rural area. A Census map is located at http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/reps/maps/us_census.html
that shows the nine Census divisions and four Census regions clearly.
In Figure 17, the percent of households that have a separate freezer is
highest in the West North Central (48 percent) and in the East South Central
Division (42 percent), and lowest in the New England and Pacific Divisions
(23 percent). Housing units located in rural parts of the country have,
by far, the highest percentage of housing units with separate freezers
at 54 percent (Figure 18).
Electric Coffee Makers
An appliance that one may
intuitively think almost every household would have, or would have percentage
equivalence across income levels would be the electric coffee maker.
But surprisingly, it is not. Instead, the percentage increases with income
level from 46 percent to 79 percent (Figure 19). The percent of housing units that use the electric coffee maker between
one time per day to a few times per week is roughly equal across household types(Figure 20).
Microwave Ovens
For microwave
ovens (Figure 21), there are a high percentage of households (75 percent)
that own a microwave in the lowest income level. The percentages gradually
increase from 75 percent to 93 percent for the highest income level.
In Figure 22, the percent that use a microwave for more than half of their
cooking is highest in single-person households at 40 percent and lowest
in couple only households at 23 percent.
The "couple" household has the highest percentage of types of households
(76 percent) that use the conventional oven between once per day and once
per week. The percentages are between 68 and 76 percent for all types
of households except for the “single-person”
household, which has only 48 percent (Figure
23). The single-person household also has the lowest percentage
of housing units that has between one and two hot meals per day cooked
in their home (Figure 24) at 55 percent. Couples with others living with
them have the highest at 73 percent. But the single-person household
has the highest percentage of housing units that have a few hot meals
per week cooked in their home at 27 percent. If both numbers in Figure
24 are summed together, the lowest is the single-person at 82 percent
and the highest is the couple at 91 percent. The single-person household
is making hot meals, but just not as often. A possible explanation for
this difference is the single-person household tends to go out to eat
more often than other types of households.
Contact:
Mailto:Stephanie.Battles@eia.doe.gov
Stephanie Battles
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Fax: (202) 586-0018
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