The number of Americans living below the poverty line rose to a record 46 million last year, Reuters reported.

The Census Bureau’s annual report on income, poverty and health insurance coverage said the national poverty rate climbed for a third consecutive year to 15.1 percent in 2010 as the economy struggled to recover from the recession that began in December 2007 and ended in June 2009.

That marked a 0.8 percentage point increase from 2009 when there were 43.6 million Americans living in poverty.

The number of poor Americans in 2010, a different measure than the poverty rate, was the largest in the 52 years that the Census Bureau has been publishing poverty estimates. The poverty rate was the highest since 1993.

Americans saw their median annual income decline 2.3 percent to an annual $49,445. About 1.5 million fewer Americans were covered by employer-sponsored health insurance plans, and the number of people covered by government health insurance increased by nearly 2 million.