Category: Poverty and Policy Matters

Disparities in Poverty Persist and Grow

September 29, 2011 at 2:07 pmCategory:Poverty and Policy Matters

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A North Carolina Budget and Tax Center (BTC) brief released last week showed that families in North Carolina are severely feeling the effects of the flagging economy. African American and Latino families in the state, however, have been particularly hard hit.

While the poverty rate for the state increased significantly to 17.5 percent in 2010, the poverty rate for African American North Carolinians was more than ten percentage points higher than the state figure and the rate for Hispanic or Latino North Carolinians stood at 33.9 percent. That translates to 1 in 4 African Americans and 1 in 3 Latinos in the state who are living under the federal poverty level.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey, 2007 and 2010

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Measuring Economic Hardship

September 28, 2011 at 5:23 pmCategory:Poverty and Policy Matters | Uncategorized

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The release of the Census Bureau data each year brings attention to a particular measure of economic hardship–the official or federal poverty line.  And while it is certainly staggering that more than 17 percent of North Carolinians are earning less than $22,314 for a family of four, and more than 728,000 North Carolinians had half that income in 2010, there is a general consensus that the poverty line does not capture the full scope of economic hardship. Thus, the number of folks facing challenges in getting by is likely much greater.

The Federal Poverty Level (FPL) was designed in the 1960s to determine the minimum income necessary for a family to survive, not to be economically secure. Most notably, the FPL is based only on the cost of food and assumes that cost accounts for one-third of family expenses, ignores expenses that are significant today but were not common in 1960, like child care, was designed to measure after-tax income but today is applied to pre-tax income, thereby inaccurately portraying the amount of money a family actually has available to spend. It also is the same across the nation and does not take into account cost-of-living variations. Read More…

What about the kids?

September 27, 2011 at 2:16 pmCategory:Poverty and Policy Matters

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Last week’s BTC brief discussing the recently released American Community Survey 2010 poverty data noted that child poverty in North Carolina rose from 19.2 percent in 2007 to 24.6 percent in 2010. Essentially this means that since the beginning of the Great Recession, the share of North Carolina’s children in poverty has gone from 1 in 5 children to 1 in 4 children.

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Poverty extends its reach across NC

September 26, 2011 at 2:23 pmCategory:Poverty and Policy Matters

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A brief released last week by the NC Budget and Tax Center shows that the prolonged weak recovery is crippling the economy and creating economic distress for working families in NC. The state poverty rate ($22,314 for a family of four) climbed to 17.5 percent in 2010, a 22 percent increase since 2007 when the Great Recession began.

But there was more to the data released last week than state level numbers. The US Census Bureau also provided poverty levels and household income for areas with at least 65,000 people. There are 39 counties in NC that fit this criterion.** County-level poverty rates in NC ranged from 7.8 percent in Union County to 31.1 percent in Robeson County. 1 county had a poverty rate less than 10 percent, 16 counties had rates ranging from 10 percent to 17.5 percent (the state rate), and 22 counties had rates above 17.5 percent. Read More…

Poverty Rate Edges Up During the Official Recovery of the Great Recession

September 23, 2011 at 2:59 pmCategory:Poverty and Policy Matters

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The 2010 poverty data that was released by the Census Bureau yesterday demonstrate that the significant increases in poverty felt during the Great Recession were only the tip of the iceberg. The North Carolina Budget and Tax Center (BTC) released a brief today showing that the poor are getting poorer and the middle class is eroding.

The poverty rate in North Carolina was 17.5% in 2010, up 22% since 2007 and 2.2 percentage points higher than the U.S. poverty rate in 2010. 1.6 million North Carolinians have incomes below the poverty line, which corresponds to an income of $22,314 for a family of four. The share of North Carolinians living in deep poverty—an income of $11,157 for a family of four—rose 1.8 percentage points from 2007 to 2010. Last month, the BTC estimated that a family of four actually needs an annual income of $48,814 to make ends meet in the state. Read More…