State to finally replace ancient jobless-claims computer, By Jim Stratton, May 21, 2013, Orlando Sentinel: “In good news for the jobless and employers alike, the state’s 1970s-era computer that processes unemployment claims is finally getting replaced. The new system is coming this fall, five years after the computer almost ground to a halt. The $63 million network is expected to make online filing easier for jobless Floridians. Officials say it will give them ready access to their payment history and allow them to quickly determine whether a claim has been approved. It should ease the workload on employers — who pay for the state’s unemployment trust fund — and help the state reduce and recover overpayments. Officials with the Department of Economic Opportunity estimate it will cut program costs by $43 million a year…”
Kids Count Report – New Jersey
- Poverty up 20 percent among N.J. children 5 and younger, report says, By Susan K. Livio, May 22, 2013, Star-Ledger: “More than two years after the nation’s deep recession formally ended, a new report released today says the sharp economic downturn continued to drive an unprecedented number of New Jersey families into poverty, forcing them to rely on such safety net programs as food stamps, reduced-cost school meals programs and Medicaid. Almost one-third of New Jersey’s children 5 and younger were living in low-income homes in 2011 — defined as earning at or below 200 percent of the poverty level, or about $37,000 for a family of three — according to the report, called ‘Kids Count,’ which was prepared by Advocates for Children of New Jersey and funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a national nonprofit and nonpartisan family research organization…”
- South Jersey counties see increase in poor children, By Rita Giordano, May 22, 2013, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Camden and Gloucester counties both saw an increase in the percentage of children living in poverty from 2010 to 2011, while in Burlington County, median family income dropped and more than half of the county’s families paid more than the recommended 30 percent of income for housing, according to a new study released Wednesday..”
SNAP and Work Requirements – Wisconsin
Report: Job training rule for food stamps would trim rolls by half, By Jason Stein, May 20, 2013, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Requiring a job — or basic training for one — from able-bodied participants in the state’s food stamp program would cause about half of them to drop out, a total of tens of thousands of people statewide and 14,500 in Milwaukee, according to a new report. The new projections come from the Legislature’s nonpartisan budget office, which last week released its analysis of Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to require 62,700 able-bodied adults without children in Wisconsin’s FoodShare program to work or attend bare-bones job training…”
Housing Program – Tacoma, WA
Tacoma program uses housing to promote good parenting, self-sufficiency, By Rob Carson, May 19, 2013, Tacoma News Tribune: “When Mike and Shawna Allen first heard about the McCarver Program, the deal sounded too good to be true. The Allens were close to desperation at the time — crammed into a Tacoma homeless shelter with three small children, no money and no prospect of jobs. The deal was this: The Tacoma Housing Authority would give them and 49 other homeless families practically free homes for a year — their rent would be $25 a month. Each year during the five-year program, the families’ contributions to their housing costs would increase by 20 percent, until they’d be paying the full price in the sixth year. During that time, they’d have access to job training, parenting classes, child care, counselors to help them work through lingering drug and mental health issues, plus an array of other social and health services. All the Allens and the other families had to do in return was enroll their kids at McCarver Elementary School, on Tacoma’s Hilltop, and keep them there through fifth grade…”
Black Unemployment Rate – Michigan
Michigan’s black unemployment rate much higher than white rate, but why?, By Melissa Anders, May 20, 2013, mlive: “Nearly one in five black workers in Michigan is unemployed — more than twice the rate for white workers. The unemployment rate for black workers in Michigan is 18.7 percent, compared to 7.5 percent for white workers in the fourth quarter of 2012, according to a recent report from Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute, a liberal-leaning think tank. Nationally, the black unemployment rate was 14 percent and the white rate was 6.3 percent at that time, according to the report…”
Suburban Poverty
- Poverty hits home in local suburbs like S. King County, By Lornet Turnbull, May 19, 2013, Seattle Times: “The idea of suburban America conjures up images of Ward and June Cleaver, of safe streets and good schools, prosperity and homogeny. But new findings released Monday by the Brookings Institution are flipping such conventional thinking about American suburbs on its head: In the past decade and for the first time, the majority of poor people were living not in big cities but in suburbs. Nowhere is suburbanization of poverty more evident than in South King County, where affordable housing has drawn immigrants and refugees coming here from across the globe as well as low-income families forced from Seattle by skyrocketing housing costs…”
- Suburbs’ share of poor has grown since 2000, by Sam Roberts, May 20, 2013, New York Times: “The suburbs, which in 2000 accounted for 29 percent of the region’s poor people, a decade later were home to 33 percent of metropolitan New Yorkers living below the federal poverty level, according to an analysis of the latest census results…”
- Advocates struggle to reach growing ranks of suburban poor, By Pam Fessler, May 20, 2013, National Public Radio: “Poverty has grown everywhere in the U.S. in recent years, but mostly in the suburbs. During the 2000s, it grew twice as fast in suburban areas as in cities, with more than 16 million poor people now living in the nation’s suburbs — more than in urban or rural areas. Elizabeth Kneebone, a fellow with the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution, says this shift in poverty can be seen in Montgomery County, Md., right outside the nation’s capital…”
- Study confirms poverty hits the suburbs, too, By Alfred Lubrano, May 20, 2013, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Say poverty in the Philadelphia area, and it conjures images of North Philadelphia or Kensington, not the suburbs. But the suburbs on both sides of the Delaware River are becoming steadily poorer, part of a national trend that confounds long-held beliefs that life is always better in greener pastures beyond urban limits…”
- U.S. suburban poverty growing, but trend mixed in Miami-Dade, Broward, By Andres Viglucci, May 20 2013, Miami Herald: “Across the country, the poverty rate is surging in the suburbs, where the number of poor people is growing much faster than in central cities — a largely unrecognized reversal that calls for a retooling of federal anti-poverty, economic development and transit funding, the Brookings Institution has found…”
- More poor live in suburbs than in urban areas, research shows, By Emily Alpert, May 19, 2013, Los Angeles Times: “Bucking longstanding patterns in the United States, more poor people now live in the nation’s suburbs than in urban areas, according to a new analysis. As poverty mounted throughout the nation over the past decade, the number of poor people living in suburbs surged 67% between 2000 and 2011 — a much bigger jump than in cities, researchers for the Brookings Institution said in a book published today. Suburbs still have a smaller percentage of their population living in poverty than cities do, but the sheer number of poor people scattered in the suburbs has jumped beyond that of cities…”
April 2013 State Unemployment
- Steady hiring pushes down unemployment rates in 40 US states in April; only 3 report increases, Associated Press, May 17, 2013, Washington Post: “Solid hiring helped lower unemployment rates in 40 U.S. states last month, the most since November. The declines show the job market is improving throughout most of the country. The Labor Department said Friday that unemployment rates increased in only three states: Louisiana, Tennessee and North Dakota. Rates were unchanged in seven states…”
- Jobless rates fell in 40 states and D.C. in April, By Doug Carroll, May 17, 2013, USA Today: “Unemployment rates fell in 40 states and the District of Columbia in April, the government reported Friday. Three states had increases while jobless rates were unchanged in seven states…”
Income Inequality in Developed Countries
- Income inequality in industrialized world continues to grow, says OECD, By Tavia Grant, May 14, 2013, Globe and Mail: “Income inequality is growing across the industrialized world, including Canada, with the global financial crisis deepening the divide between the rich and the poor, says an analysis to be released Wednesday. And the rate of change is quickening. The income gap increased at a faster pace in the three years to 2010 than it had in the previous 12 years, according to an Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development report…”
- Report: Income inequality rising in most developed countries, By Eliza Mackintosh, May 16, 2013, Washington Post: “The divide between rich and poor is widening in developed nations, according to a new report released Wednesday by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. According to the new data, economic disparity has risen more from 2007 to 2010 than in the preceding 12 years. Over this period, the OECD has documented increasing income inequality caused by the financial crisis, which it says is ‘squeezing income and putting pressure on inequality and poverty…’”
- Young and poor hit hardest as UK cuts widen inequality, says OECD, By Randeep Ramesh, May 14, 2013, The Guardian: “The OECD has warned that Britain faces rising levels of inequality by pursuing austerity polices that are widening the gulf between rich and poor. In a report examining the developed world’s response to the global slowdown, the thinktank warns that the ‘financial crisis is squeezing income and putting pressure on inequality and poverty’ across the board…”
Mixed-Income Housing – Nashville, TN
Mixed-income plan could lift Nashville public housing, By Joey Garrison, May 16, 2013, USA Today: “Long before Nashville’s Cumberland River found new life as an attraction, a slum community thrived along its East Bank. It grew during the Great Depression. And as the federal government systematically built barracks in cities for the poor in the 1940s, many inhabitants found their next home nearby: a new publicly subsidized housing development erected where a women’s college and mansion had been torn down near East Nashville’s Shelby Avenue. Here, on 64 rolling acres, emerged the James A. Cayce Homes, the doorstep to East Nashville and the city’s largest public housing neighborhood, shadowed by a loud interstate and plagued historically by crime and poverty. But today, as once-forgotten, now-buzzing East Nashville continues its rebirth, the city’s most visible swath of public housing — suddenly occupying a coveted location — is the subject of a planning process to rethink and potentially tear down, rebuild and overhaul the community…”
Medicaid Expansion
- Most doctors still reject Medicaid as program expansion nears, By Tony Pugh, May 13, 2013, Charlotte Observer: “Sandra Duck thinks she’s the victim of an undeclared Medicaid boycott. And she’s probably right. When her artificial right hip became infected with the superbug MRSA in late 2009, Dr. Dale Mitchum, a general surgeon, drained, cleaned and closed the infected area. But when the infection returned in early 2010, Mitchum knew Duck needed another hip replacement surgery, which he couldn’t perform. He tried to find an orthopedic surgeon who would operate. More than a year later, he’s still trying. ‘I cannot find a living soul that will touch her,’ he said recently. ‘And I’ve tried everywhere, from Tallahassee to Pensacola.’ Doctors in several states outside Florida also have refused to operate on Duck, who’s covered by Medicaid, the state-federal health insurance program for poor people and those with disabilities. Because of the program’s history of low payments, fewer than half of U.S. doctors and other health care professionals accept Medicaid patients, according to a recent study…”
- Medicaid expansion left out of Michigan Senate budget, leaving proposal in doubt, By Tim Martin, May 16, 2013, mlive.com: “The Republican-led Michigan Legislature is continuing to advance budget bills that do not include an expansion of Medicaid through the federal Affordable Care Act or ‘Obamacare,’ leaving the proposal in jeopardy…”
- Senate committee advances budget; final vote set today, By Mary Jo Pitzl, May 15, 2013, Arizona Republic: “An $8.8 billion state budget for the coming year cleared its first hurdle Wednesday as senators split along partisan lines on key issues, moving along a budget their leaders had negotiated with Gov. Jan Brewer. But the big battle looms today when the Senate is expected to debate Medicaid expansion…”
Farm Bill and SNAP
Senate panel passes $500 billion farm bill, By Christopher Doering, May 14, 2013, USA Today: “The Senate Agriculture Committee passed a sweeping new five-year, half-trillion dollar farm bill on Tuesday as lawmakers made another attempt to craft a new agriculture policy after falling short in 2012. The legislation, which included many of the same programs and reforms that were in the farm bills that failed in Congress last year, would slash subsidy payments, expand crop insurance and carry out deep cuts to the country’s popular food stamp program…”
Jobless Benefits
- Longer benefits keep people jobless? Maybe not, By Mark Koba, May 15, 2013, CNBC: “Despite arguments to the contrary, giving unemployed Americans extended jobless benefits of up to 99 weeks didn’t prevent them from taking jobs, according a new report. Released last month through the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, the study says that the extended benefits given from 2009 to 2012 to the unemployed increased the overall employment rate by only 0.04 percentage points, which the report says is small in comparison to the peak recession unemployment rate of 10 percent…”
- Pa. lags getting aid to jobless, By Alfred Lubrano, May 13, 2013, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Pennsylvania has demonstrated ‘continued failure’ in paying first-time unemployment benefits in a timely fashion, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. Further, the commonwealth has been ‘trending downward’ in its efforts to get payments to state residents on time, the department added in a March 29 letter…”
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – Pennsylvania
A year later, Pa. food-stamp test called too complex, By Alfred Lubrano, May 3, 2013, Philadelphia Inquirer: “A year ago this week, Pennsylvania tied eligibility for food stamps to the assets people possess. Since then, nearly 4,000 households have lost or were denied benefits because they had too many financial resources, according to the Department of Public Welfare. In that same time, many more people – around 111,000 households – were denied benefits because they failed to provide proper documentation for the asset test…”
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – New York City
Many Staten Islanders in need miss out on food stamps, By Judy L. Randall, May 13, 2013, Staten Island Advance: “The way Saeeda Usmani sees it, her participation in the federal food stamp program has been a godsend. At 71, the retired nurse from Stapleton couldn’t afford to maintain her medically mandated gluten-free diet, which can be pricey, without assistance. As it is, because Ms. Usmani tires easily, she goes to the supermarket only every three weeks and carefully husbands the fresh fruits and vegetables that she purchases with the $173 she receives each month from the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), the current name for food stamps. But Ms. Usmani is something of a rarity among SNAP-eligible low-income Staten Islanders 60 and older: Only 23 percent participate in the program here, the lowest percentage among the five boroughs…”
Jobless Benefits – Wisconsin, Florida
- Measure requiring 4 work searches per week for jobless benefits passes, By Jason Stein, May 13, 2013, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Jobless workers getting state benefits could have to double their number of work searches to at least four per week from two currently – raising Wisconsin’s requirements to among the highest in the nation, under a provision approved by the Legislature’s budget committee Monday. The Joint Finance Committee voted 12-4 along party lines to approve the changes proposed by Gov. Scott Walker to allow his administration to impose an even higher number of work searches across the state or in specific regions, putting Wisconsin at the lead nationally for work requirements for unemployment insurance. Workers would need to comply with the requirements in order to keep receiving their benefits…”
- Sequester forces 4-week cut in jobless benefits, By Jim Stratton, May 13, 2013, Orlando Sentinel: “Florida will soon slash four weeks of unemployment benefits to laid-off workers nearing the end of their eligibility. The reduction is happening because of the so-called sequestration, the automatic federal budget cuts that began in March. Up to 100,000 laid-off workers could be have their benefits cut off. Florida’s maximum weekly payment is $275 a week, so a four-week cut could cost the jobless up to $1,100. The average person will lose about $924, the state said…”
Child Poverty in the UK
- One in four UK children will be living in poverty by 2020, says thinktank, By Randeep Ramesh, May 7, 2013, The Guardian: “One in four children in Britain – 3.4 million – will be in relative poverty by 2020, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has warned. In a report, conducted for the Northern Ireland executive but held to describe the position in the UK as a whole, the IFS says ‘tax and benefit reforms introduced since April 2010 can account for almost all of the increases in child poverty projected over the next few years’…”
- 1.1m children forecast to fall back into poverty – wiping out a decade of gains, By John Bingham, May 7, 2013, The Telegraph: “The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) revised its previous estimates to forecast that 3.4 million British children will be living in households classed as in poverty by the end of a decade dominated by recession. The new projection, contained in an analysis commissioned by the devolved Northern Ireland Executive, means that the number of children in poverty is set to increase by 1.1 million this decade, instead of 800,000 as previously thought. It would take the UK back to the child poverty levels last seen at the turn of the century when the then Prime Minister Tony Blair announced a plan to ‘eradicate’ it…”
Foster Care Reforms – Florida
Nation is watching Florida’s new foster-care reforms, By Kate Santich, May 9, 2013, Orlando Sentinel: “For thousands of foster kids across Florida, life is about to become a little more ‘normal.’ Under newly passed laws being watched by much of the nation, children growing up in the state’s care will soon be allowed to play sports, sleep over at a friend’s house, go to a movie or do any of the things other children do without their caretakers having to pursue background checks and court orders. Also, instead of having to leave foster care on their 18th birthdays, they’ll have the option of staying until age 21 as long as they’re going to school, working or getting job training…”
States and Medicaid Expansion
- Medicaid health insurance to expand under Obamacare in Kentucky, By Jessie Halladay, May 10, 2013, Louisville Courier-Journal: “More than 300,000 uninsured Kentuckians will become eligible for Medicaid after Gov. Steve Beshear announced Thursday that the state will expand the health insurance program — taking advantage of President Barack Obama’s controversial Affordable Care Act…”
- Mich. House GOP presents plan to expand Medicaid, By Chad Livengood, May 9, 2013, Detroit News: “A House Republican proposal to expand the income eligibility limit for Medicaid health insurance for the poor emerged Thursday after months of debate over Gov. Rick Snyder’s plan to add more than 400,000 Michiganians to the program. But the plan is far different than the across-the-board expansion of the existing program that the Republican governor requested, and it’s predicated on federal approval of major changes to the Medicaid program in Michigan…”
- How some rural areas are being pinched by lack of Medicaid expansion, By Blake Farmer, May 9, 2013, Marketplace: “An expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act is supposed to cover more of the working poor and balance out cuts that were made to already-struggling hospitals. But Republican-led states have been opting out or at least holding out, and outlying areas in states like Tennessee may be the hardest hit…”
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
Cuts are coming for food stamps if farm bill is passed, though unclear how deep, By Mary Clare Jalonick (AP), May 8, 2013, Washington Post: “The government’s food stamp program, which helps feed 1 in every 7 America, was one of the few programs exempted from this year’s automatic spending cuts. But now it is likely to get trimmed. Unresolved is by how much. The Democratic chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee is only willing to take roughly one-half of 1 percent, or about $400 million annually, off the top as the panel prepares to move a massive farm bill through committee next week. Her Republican counterpart in the House, also preparing to consider a farm bill next week, would give the program a makeover and cut it by five times that amount…”
Education and the Working Poor – California
- Lack of learning among low-income families could hamper California’s economic recovery, report says, By Josh Dulaney, May 8, 2013, Long Beach Press-Telegram: “A new report released Wednesday cautions that the lack of higher education among California’s low-income families could further hurt the state’s economy over the next decade. According to the Los Angeles-based Campaign for College Opportunity, which worked on the report with the Women’s Foundation of California, the state faces a shortage of 2.3 million college graduates and those with vocational certificates by 2025, even as the demand for highly educated workers continues to grow…”
- State working poor lack education opportunities, report says, By Carla Rivera, May 8, 2013, Los Angeles Times: “California has the highest number of working poor families in the nation, but the state does an ineffective job of providing educational opportunities to boost them out of poverty, according to a new report released Wednesday. The report, Working Hard, Left Behind, found that the state has the largest number of adults without a high school diploma or equivalent and ranks last among states in the percentage of low-income working families in which neither parent has a college education…”