- Study: More Minnesota children in poverty; worst in northwest, By Ryan Johnson, May 31, 2012, Pioneer Press: “After a long streak of boasting one of the nation’s lowest rates of children living in poverty, Minnesota has been ‘slipping’ in recent years compared with the rest of the nation, said research director Kara Arzamendia with the Children’s Defense Fund. About 9 percent of the state’s children lived in poverty in 2000, but the number shot up to 15 percent by 2010, the latest data available. That year, about 192,000 of the state’s under-18 population lived in households with incomes less than $22,314 for a family of four. ‘Things have been going in the wrong direction,’ Arzamendia said. That was one of the findings in the latest Kids Count report released Wednesday, May 30. For more than two decades, the Annie E. Casey Foundation has released the state-by-state data book that tracks several factors in children’s health and well-being and aims to raise awareness of the issues now facing children across the nation…”
- More Minn. children living in poverty, By Conrad Wilson, May 31, 2012, Minnesota Public Radio: “Audrey Thayer works with children and families in northern Minnesota who live on the edge of poverty. Many have income that falls below federal poverty guidelines. As a result, there is a constant demand for services. ‘We’ll get one family up and running, and another family arrives,’ said Thayer, coordinator of the Minnesota Greater Racial Justice Project. ‘Same situation.’ ‘It’s almost like a revolving door,’ Thayer said of the Bemidji-based advocacy group’s work. ‘Behind that door, there’s tons out there. We don’t know. We never know how many are going to come through that door, but they do. And in eight years, I have never seen that subside.’ A new report by the Children’s Defense Fund-Minnesota shows more children are living in poverty. In 2000, roughly 110,000 children statewide lived at or below the poverty line. In 2010, that number was up to nearly 200,000…”
Monthly Archives: May 2012
Medicaid Experiment – Oregon
Oregon’s Medicaid experiment represents a ‘defining moment’, By Kristian Foden-Vencil, May 30, 2012, National Public Radio: “The things that Amy Vance does for James Prasad are pretty simple: She calls doctors with him, organizes his meds, and helps him keep tabs on his blood pressure, blood sugar and weight. These simple things – and the relationship between a health coach like Vance and a chronically ill Medicaid patient like Prasad – are a big part of a $2 billion health care experiment in Oregon. Gov. John Kitzhaber, a Democrat and a former emergency room doctor, has convinced the federal government that he has a way to make Medicaid treatment better, and cheaper, by completely changing the way the sickest people in Oregon get health care…”
UNICEF Report on Child Poverty
- Child poverty in UK set to increase as result of austerity drive, says Unicef, By Amelia Gentleman, May 29, 2012, The Guardian: “The government’s austerity drive is set to reverse the strides made in reducing child poverty in the UK, research published by Unicef on Tuesday suggests. The study indicates that during the early years of the recession, the UK was more successful than other rich countries in reducing child poverty and protecting children from deprivation, but warns that spending cuts will swiftly undermine this progress…”
- US has second-highest rate of childhood poverty in developed world, only Romania is worse, By Ashley Portero, May 30, 2012, International Business Times: “The United States has the second-highest rate of childhood poverty in the developed world, according to a new report from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), which concluded that nations with comprehensive government programs designed to protect vulnerable children had the lowest rates of child poverty and deprivation. Out of the 35 wealthiest countries analyzed by UNICEF, only one, Romania, had a child poverty rate above the 23 percent rate recorded in the U.S. The rate is based on the definition of relative poverty used by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which states a child is living in poverty if he or she is growing up in a household where disposable income, when adjusted for family size and compensation, is less than 50 percent of the median disposable income for the country in question…”
- Canada lags on fighting child poverty, report finds, By Laurie Monsebraaten, May 29, 2012, Toronto Star: “Canada falls below most of its international peers when it comes to fighting child poverty, says a new report by the United Nations Children’s Fund being released Tuesday. With a child poverty rate of 13.3 per cent, Canada ranks 24th out of 35 industrialized nations, behind the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and most of northern Europe, says the UNICEF report. Overall, the Netherlands and Nordic countries have the lowest rates of child poverty, hovering at about 7 per cent, almost half Canada’s rate. Meantime, the United States and some of the southern European countries have the highest. (Iceland has the lowest child poverty rate at 4.7 per cent and Romania has the highest at 25.5 per cent. The U.S. rate is 23 per cent.) When it comes to the size of the gap between child poverty and a nation’s overall poverty rate, Canada fares somewhat better at 18 out of 35, the report notes…”
Hospitals and Charity Care – Illinois
Legislation defines charity care for hospitals, By Peter Frost, May 29, 2012, Chicago Tribune: “Not-for-profit hospitals in Illinois facing the specter of paying millions in property taxes were granted a reprieve Tuesday when the state Senate passed legislation that will allow hospitals to apply a much broader definition for what qualifies as charity care. The legislation, embedded in a bill that seeks to raise about $700 million for the state’s underfunded Medicaid program through a $1-per-pack cigarette tax, sets a clear formula for how much free care and services hospitals must provide to qualify for tax breaks, ending nearly 10 years of wrangling on the issue. It requires that hospitals provide an equal or greater amount of free or discounted services to low-income patients each year than their annual estimated property tax liability to qualify for an exemption…”
Extended Jobless Benefits
U.S. winds down longer benefits for the unemployed, By Shaila Dewan, May 28, 2012, New York Times: “Hundreds of thousands of out-of-work Americans are receiving their final unemployment checks sooner than they expected, even though Congress renewed extended benefits until the end of the year. The checks are stopping for the people who have the most difficulty finding work: the long-term unemployed. More than five million people have been out of work for longer than half a year. Federal benefit extensions, which supplemented state funds for payments up to 99 weeks, were intended to tide over the unemployed until the job market improved. In February, when the program was set to expire, Congress renewed it, but also phased in a reduction of the number of weeks of extended aid and effectively made it more difficult for states to qualify for the maximum aid. Since then, the jobless in 23 states have lost up to five months’ worth of benefits…”
Child Welfare System – Arizona
Arizona’s courts overloaded with CPS cases, By Mary K. Reinhart, May 26, 2012, Arizona Republic: “When the state of Arizona takes custody of a child because of suspected abuse or neglect, authorities ultimately have one goal: finding a safe, permanent home for the child. It’s up to the courts to decide whether to reunite children with parents or place them with relatives or an adoptive family, and experts agree it should happen as quickly as possible. The more time passes, the more likely the children will be traumatized by their experience with the child-welfare system. A recent increase in the number of foster children, with no corresponding rise in staff, has put mounting pressure on juvenile courts and made it more difficult to quickly resolve these cases. In Maricopa County, juvenile ‘dependency’ cases, in which judges determine when or whether a child can return home, have increased by nearly 40 percent during the past three years…”
Unemployment Benefits – Pennsylvania, Florida
- Pennsylvania’s unemployment fund owes feds $3.87 billion, By Jane M. Von Bergen, May 23, 2012, Philadelphia Inquirer: “The fund that pays Pennsylvania’s unemployment benefits is running in the red, and lawmakers are grappling with how to remedy that. Compounding matters is that the state owes the federal government $3.87 billion it has borrowed to pay jobless claims because of the recession. There seems to be little disagreement about how to pay back the money: Legislators are likely to pass a bill that will allow the state to float a bond. ‘This is akin to refinancing your house,’ said Pennsylvania Secretary of Labor Julia Hearthway. ‘It’s the lowest interest rate we’re going to have for years to come.’ But there is considerable debate about how to solve the underlying problem: that the fund is paying out more than it takes in. Pennsylvania’s fund ‘is structurally insolvent,’ according to the department’s analysis. In 2011, it paid out $3 billion but collected only $2.7 billion…”
- Groups claim thousands being denied jobless benefits in Florida, By Toluse Olorunnipa, May 24, 2012, Miami Herald: “A national workers’ rights group has filed a federal complaint over Florida’s revamped unemployment compensation system, claiming that the Sunshine State has become the most difficult place in the nation for unemployed people seeking benefits. Last year, Florida overhauled its unemployment compensation system, reducing the number of weeks available and enacting several new requirements for those who seek jobless benefits. The National Employment Law Project (NELP) and Florida Legal Services say the changes have slammed tens of thousands of unemployed Floridians. The complaints say only 15 percent of eligible unemployed Floridians are actually getting benefits, ranking Florida dead last in a nation that averages 27 percent…”
- Florida law thwarts jobless benefits, advocates tell feds, By Jim Stratton, May 24, 2012, Orlando Sentinel: “Advocates for the unemployed called Thursday for a federal investigation of a Florida law they say systematically tries to prevent laid-off workers from receiving jobless benefits. State regulations approved last year have made Florida the toughest state in the nation in which to get jobless benefits, detractors say, lowering significantly the percentage of the unemployed who now qualify for benefits. The National Employment Law Project and Florida Legal Services want the U.S. Labor Department to investigate and overturn the regulations that tightened the state’s unemployment-eligibility rules…”
State Medicaid Cuts – Illinois
- Legislature OKs Medicaid cuts; no vote yet on cigarette tax, By Doug Finke and Chris Wetterich, May 24, 2012, State Journal-Register: “The Illinois House and Senate on Thursday passed pieces of a Medicaid overhaul, including legislation slashing $1.6 billion from the program. Gov. Pat Quinn praised legislators but said their work won’t be complete until they pass a $1-per-pack cigarette tax. ‘Raising the price of cigarettes is also sound health policy. Smoking-related conditions are a significant burden on our Medicaid system, and this measure will improve the health of our people and reduce future Medicaid costs,’ he said in a statement. The House voted 94-22 and the Senate voted 44-13 to adopt the cuts in Senate Bill 2840, which range from outright elimination of some programs – like Illinois Cares Rx, a prescription drug assistance program for seniors – to taking extra steps to ensure that those receiving aid are entitled to it. The bill now heads to Quinn’s desk…”
- Illinois Legislature passes $1.6 billion in Medicaid cuts, By Ray Long and Alissa Groeninger, May 25, 2012, Chicago Tribune: “Hundreds of thousands of poor Illinoisans would lose health coverage, prescription drug discounts for seniors would be dropped and dental care for adults would be greatly curtailed as part of $1.6 billion in budget cuts lawmakers approved Thursday. The major Medicaid reductions ignited anger in some lawmakers who say the cutbacks will jeopardize the lives of the state’s most vulnerable residents. ‘I don’t know where it’s written in the law that this has to be balanced on the backs of poor people, on the backs of seniors, on the backs of the aged, blind and disabled,’ said Rep. Mary Flowers, D-Chicago. But supporters argued failure to approve the bill could lead to cuts throughout state government and result in the collapse of the entire Medicaid system…”
Foster Care and Kinship Families – New Jersey
N.J. foster children placed in homes with relatives more often than in other states, report says, By Megan DeMarco, May 23, 2012, Star-Ledger: “A higher percentage of children in New Jersey’s foster care system are being placed with relatives and close friends than in nearly every other state, a report released today found. About 35 percent of kids in New Jersey foster care are being raised by grandparents, aunts, uncles or close friends – which child advocates call ‘kinship families,’ according to the Annie E. Casey foundation report. Nationally, 26 percent of kids in foster care were placed in kinship families from 2009 through last year. Only Hawaii, Florida and Arizona place a higher percentage than New Jersey, which was in a three-way tie with Illinois and Michigan…”
Chronic Homelessness – New Orleans, LA
Chronic, longtime homelessness has been nearly halved in Orleans and Jefferson parishes, By Katy Reckdahl, May 23, 2012, New Orleans Times-Picayune: “For 28 years, Miller Osbey survived with the help of a shopping cart. But for six weeks now, the massive plastic buggy has been parked inside Osbey’s living room, near the front door. Osbey, 60, patted the cart fondly as he passed it earlier this week. ‘I ain’t gonna let it go,’ he said. Less than two months ago, Osbey moved into one of 2,116 apartments in Orleans and Jefferson parishes that house homeless people with severe disabilities. The apartments aim to keep even severely impaired homeless people housed by pairing rental vouchers with intensive social services and mental health and medical services, paid for by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the Housing Authority of New Orleans and various state agencies. A separate federal program provides similar housing and services through the local Veterans Affairs hospital for homeless veterans…”
Child Poverty Rate – South Africa
More than half of South Africa’s children live in poverty, By Aislinn Laing, May 21, 2012, The Telegraph: “Eighteen years after the end of apartheid, South Africa is now judged to be one of the most unequal societies in the world and its 19 million children bear the brunt of the disconnect. The Unicef report found that 1.4 million children live in homes that rely on often dirty streams for drinking water, 1.5 million have no flushing lavatories and 1.7 million live in shacks, with no proper bedding, cooking or washing facilities. Four in 10 live in homes where no one is employed and, in cases of dire poverty, the figure rises to seven in 10…”
Rural Poverty Rates
SD has highest rural poverty rate in Great Plains, By Marcus Traxler, May 23, 2012, Mitchell Daily Republic: “South Dakota has the highest rate of rural poverty in a 10-state region of the Great Plains, and more than one-fourth of the state’s rural children live in poverty, according to a report by the Center for Rural Affairs. According to 2010 census data used in the report, 20.6 percent of South Dakotans in rural counties live in poverty. That’s 44,973 of the state’s 218,821 rural residents. Montana was the next closest state with a rural poverty rate of 17.8 percent. A rural county is defined by the U.S. Census Bureau as a county with a population center less than 10,000 residents in size and is not in a metropolitan or micropolitan area…”
Teenage Pregnancy
Teenage pregnancy: High US rates due to poverty, not promiscuity, By Stephanie Hanes, May 22, 2012, Christian Science Monitor: “Why is a teenage girl in Mississippi four times as likely to give birth than a teenage girl in New Hampshire? (And 15 times more likely to give birth than a teen in Switzerland?) Or why is the teen birth rate in Massachusetts 19.6 per 1,000, while it’s 47.7 per 1,000 in Washington, D.C.? And why, despite a 40 percent drop over two decades, are teen moms still far more common in the US than elsewhere across the developed world? (And nope, it’s not that American teens have more sex. Many studies have found that US teenagers have less sex than compatriots in Europe.) The answer, according to a study published today in the Journal of Economic Perspectives, may well lie in social inequality…”
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – New York City
Cuomo pushing city to end food-stamp fingerprinting, By John Eligon, May 17, 2012, New York Times: “New York City would have to stop requiring the electronic fingerprinting of food stamp applicants under regulations proposed on Thursday by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who has sided with advocates for the hungry who say it discourages people from seeking benefits. New York State stopped requiring the fingerprinting of food stamp recipients in 2007, but granted an exemption to the city at the request of the Bloomberg administration, which said fingerprinting was the best way to prevent fraud. Mr. Cuomo said many New Yorkers eligible for the federal food stamp program did not receive them in part because of the stigma associated with being fingerprinted…”
State Medicaid Cuts – Illinois
Quinn’s Medicaid bill makes nearly $1.4B in cuts, Associated Press, May 21, 2012, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “Illinois moved closer to drastic Medicaid cuts Monday with proposed legislation that could excise nearly $1.4 billion from the state’s program by shrinking benefits, such as regular adult dental care, and cutting payments to most hospitals and nursing homes. The measure, backed by Gov. Pat Quinn, falls short of the $2.7 billion in cuts that Quinn originally said would be needed to prevent the health care program for the poor and disabled from collapsing…”
Income Inequality – New York City
More earners at extremes in New York than in U.S., By Patrick McGeehan, May 20, 2012, New York Times: “The wealthiest 1 percent of New York City residents took in nearly one-third of the personal income in the city in 2009 – almost double the comparable proportion nationwide, a new study shows. In a report scheduled to be released on Monday, the city comptroller’s office found that large percentages of New Yorkers earned high incomes and low incomes, leaving a smaller middle class than in the nation as a whole…”
Poverty Rate – New Jersey
Poverty numbers are grim in N.J., By Alfred Lubrano, May 20, 2012, Philadelphia Inquirer: “More New Jersey residents lived in poverty in 2010 than ever before, according to a report released Sunday. A record 885,0000 people in the state, nearly 300,000 of them children, lived below the poverty line, say authors of an analysis by the Legal Services of New Jersey Poverty Research Institute in Edison, which is based on the most recent numbers available. Overall, the poverty rate increased from 8.7 percent in 2008 to 9.4 percent in 2009, and finally to 10.3 percent in 2010. (By comparison, the percentage of Pennsylvanians living in poverty jumped from 11.6 in 2007 to 13.4 percent in 2010, according to the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center.) The report offers a portrait of a New Jersey devastated by recession and unemployment, particularly among adults aged 18 to 24, whose jobless rate was nearly 15 percent, compared with 9 percent for all adults in the state. More than half the total unemployed population of New Jersey had been out of work for more than six months…”
Fuel Poverty in the UK
Fuel poverty figures show decrease, but are expected to rise again, By Hilary Osborne, May 17, 2012, The Guardian: “The number of UK households in fuel poverty fell in 2010, but rising energy bills and the reduction of funds for energy efficiency measures mean the fall is likely to be short lived, experts have warned. Figures from the Department of Energy and Climate Change showed that the number of households spending more than 10% of income on fuel to maintain an adequate temperature, the official definition of fuel poverty, fell by 750,000, or 11%, in 2010 to a total of 4.75 million. Despite the fall, one in five households across the UK remained in fuel poverty, and consumer groups pointed out that a £150 increase in average bills since the period the figures cover mean many more people may have been pushed back into difficulties…”
Mortgage Settlement Being Used to Help State Budgets
Needy states using housing aid cash to plug budgets, By Shaila Dawan, May 15, 2012, New York Times: “Hundreds of millions of dollars meant to provide a little relief to the nation’s struggling homeowners is being diverted to plug state budget gaps. In a budget proposed this week, California joined more than a dozen states that want to help close gaping shortfalls using money paid by the nation’s biggest banks and earmarked for foreclosure prevention, investigations of financial fraud and blunting the ill effects of the housing crisis. California was awarded more than $400 million from the banks, and Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed using the bulk of that sum to pay the state’s debts.The money was part of a national settlement valued at $25 billion and negotiated with five big banks over abuses in their mortgage and foreclosure processes. . .”
Cross-National Social Mobility
A secret to social mobility: inherit your job from your dad, By Miles Corak, May 17, 2012, Globe and Mail: “In an article that appeared earlier this year, The New York Times described the extent to which rich parents can expect to see their children grow up to be rich adults, as well as the likelihood that the poor raise children destined for poverty. Surprisingly enough, the article came close to concluding that if Americans are interested in living the American Dream – where family background has little influence on adult outcomes – they should move to, of all places, Denmark, or if crossing the Atlantic seems daunting, then, as a second best, to Canada. Indeed, Denmark has been a darling of sorts ever since Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett highlighted in their book, The Spirit Level, that Danish life is so much better along a whole host of dimensions because income inequality is so much lower. . .”