Median income for metro Atlanta has slipped since 2000

<p>Slumping growth in the technology sector is partly to blame for a 10 percent decline in the average household income of metro Atlanta residents over a three-year period, business experts say.</p><p>The income drop occurred from 2000 to 2003, according to new data from the U.S. Census Bureau analyzed by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.</p><p>"You look at this and you can say, 'No wonder the state of Georgia was in a corner for budgets and income tax revenues,'" said John Robertson, regional economist with the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.</p><p>Median income in metro Atlanta during the 1990s went from $50,800 to $57,300, adjusted for inflation. Technology firms were on the rise, and jobs in the industry were plentiful. Things changed after 2000, and the region is continuing to feel the effects of the subsequent recession. By the end of 2003, the median income in metro Atlanta had fallen back to $51,700.</p><p>Fulton County has been hit hardest by the slump, though median incomes also are down in Gwinnett and DeKalb counties, data show.</p>