Income and Poverty — Palm Bay, Florida

The median Palm Bay household had an income of $72,614 in the ACS 2020-2024 5-year estimates (in 2024 dollars), about $5,900 below the Brevard County median of $78,476 and $1,954 below Florida's $74,568.

Each column comes from its own S1901 table: Palm Bay, Melbourne, Brevard County and Florida. Palm Bay's household median is higher than Melbourne's $66,991, but at the family level the order flips: the median Palm Bay family earns $78,947, below Melbourne's $80,376 and about $16,000 below the county's $95,102. Married couples show the widest gap, with Palm Bay's $89,448 median almost $20,000 short of the Brevard County figure.

The City of Palm Bay's own economic development profile reports a different measure. It lists an average household income of $79,356 and an average disposable income of $63,742, using ESRI data last updated in November 2023 (Discover Palm Bay). The Census survey mean for Palm Bay, $94,793, is higher; the two come from different methods and periods, so each is shown with its source.

Most Palm Bay households earn between $50,000 and $150,000 a year: 53.2 percent fall in that range in ACS 2020-2024 estimates, while 6.8 percent earn $200,000 or more against 11.1 percent across Brevard County.

The 53.2 percent is the sum of three Palm Bay brackets in table S1901: 18.3 percent at $50,000 to $74,999, 16.4 percent at $75,000 to $99,999 and 18.5 percent at $100,000 to $149,999. Palm Bay is thinner than the county at the top, with 13.8 percent of households at $150,000 or more (7.0 plus 6.8) against 20.2 percent in Brevard County (9.1 plus 11.1). At the low end the shares are close: 13.0 percent of Palm Bay households take in under $25,000 (3.4 plus 3.0 plus 6.6), against 13.3 percent countywide.

Palm Bay's distribution is a middle-income bulge rather than a split between rich and poor. That shows in the gap between the mean and the median: the Palm Bay mean of $94,793 sits $22,179 above the median, while in Brevard County the mean of $105,193 sits $26,717 above its median (S1901, Brevard County), a sign of more very high incomes in the county as a whole.

Paychecks are the main income for Palm Bay households: 75.6 percent have earnings from work, with mean earnings of $90,257, compared with 69.9 percent of households in Brevard County.

Retirement income matters less in Palm Bay than in the county. 38.7 percent of Palm Bay households receive Social Security, with a mean of $23,491, and 29.1 percent receive retirement income, with a mean of $37,535 (DP03, Palm Bay). In Brevard County those shares are 42.0 percent and 33.3 percent (DP03, Brevard County).

Public assistance reaches a larger share of Palm Bay households. 6,717 Palm Bay households, 14.6 percent, received Food Stamp or SNAP benefits in the past 12 months, against 9.4 percent in Brevard County, 11.8 percent in Melbourne (DP03, Melbourne) and 12.6 percent in Florida (DP03, Florida). 6.0 percent of Palm Bay households receive Supplemental Security Income and 4.2 percent receive cash public assistance, compared with 4.9 percent and 2.0 percent across the county.

Individual pay is lower in Palm Bay than countywide. Median earnings for all Palm Bay workers are $37,505, and men working full-time, year-round earn a median of $52,218, against $42,256 and $65,637 in Brevard County (DP03, Palm Bay; DP03, Brevard County).

Spread across every resident, Palm Bay income comes to $34,813 per person, against $44,108 in Brevard County, $42,609 in Florida and $38,249 in Melbourne (DP03, Palm Bay; Melbourne). The per-person gap with the county, $9,295, is wider in relative terms than the household gap: per person, Palm Bay stands at 79 percent of the county figure (34,813 divided by 44,108), against 93 percent for the household median (72,614 divided by 78,476).

About 11.7 percent of Palm Bay residents, 15,152 of the 129,079 people for whom poverty status is determined, lived below the federal poverty level in ACS 2020-2024 estimates.

The rows for people come from table S1701 for Palm Bay, Melbourne, Brevard County and Florida; the family row comes from table DP03. Palm Bay's overall rate sits between the county and the state, and is four points below Melbourne. The Palm Bay gap with the county is widest for older residents: 11.5 percent of Palm Bay residents 65 and over are below poverty, against 8.1 percent in Brevard County.

Children make up a large share of Palm Bay's poor. Of the 15,152 Palm Bay residents below poverty, 4,327 are under 18 and 2,804 are 65 or older (S1701, Palm Bay). Among the youngest, 17.3 percent of Palm Bay children under 5 live below the poverty line, a little under the county's 18.1 percent.

Within working ages, younger Palm Bay adults are more often poor: 12.2 percent of residents aged 18 to 34 are below poverty, compared with 9.6 percent of those aged 35 to 64 (S1701, Palm Bay). More Palm Bay women than men are below the line, 8,476 against 6,676.

In Palm Bay, poverty is concentrated among single mothers, people out of work and adults without a high school diploma, according to ACS 2020-2024 tables S1701 and DP03.

Family type is the sharpest divide. 19.3 percent of Palm Bay families headed by a woman with no spouse present are below poverty, rising to 27.7 percent when she has children under 18 and 39.0 percent when the children are all under 5 (DP03, Palm Bay). For Palm Bay married-couple families the rate is 5.7 percent. Brevard County's rates for the same groups are 18.7 percent for female-headed families and 4.6 percent for married couples (DP03, Brevard County).

Full-time work is the clearest dividing line in Palm Bay. Only 2.3 percent of Palm Bay residents who worked full-time, year-round are below poverty, against 18.6 percent of those who did not work and 14.1 percent of unemployed members of the labor force (S1701, Palm Bay). Schooling follows the same line: 23.8 percent of Palm Bay adults 25 and over without a high school diploma are poor, compared with 12.3 percent of high school graduates and 6.3 percent of those with a bachelor's degree or higher.

By race and ethnicity, 15.4 percent of Hispanic or Latino Palm Bay residents (14.7 percent countywide), 13.5 percent of Black residents and 9.1 percent of non-Hispanic white residents are below poverty in the same table. The Black rate in Palm Bay is lower than Brevard County's 16.3 percent and Florida's 19.1 percent (S1701, Brevard County; S1701, Florida). People living outside a family are the most exposed group of all: 22.3 percent of Palm Bay's unrelated individuals are poor.

About 40,265 Palm Bay residents, 31.2 percent of those measured, live on incomes below twice the poverty level, a wider group than the 11.7 percent below the line itself.

The Palm Bay ratio counts come from table S1701: 5,572 residents live below half the poverty level, 19,065 below 125 percent of it and 40,265 below 200 percent. The 31.2 percent share is 40,265 divided by 129,079. In Brevard County the same calculation gives 25.8 percent (161,289 divided by 624,135, S1701, Brevard County), and in Florida 30.2 percent (6,621,018 divided by 21,946,166). Of those 40,265 Palm Bay residents, about 25,000 have incomes above the poverty line but below twice it (40,265 minus 15,152 is 25,113).

These Palm Bay estimates average survey responses from 2020 to 2024 and carry margins of error that the Census tables publish beside each figure. Last verified: October 12, 2026, against Census tables S1901, S1701 and DP03 for Palm Bay and the Discover Palm Bay page of the City of Palm Bay.