Fewer marriages, fewer jobs: what’s contributing to poverty?, By Katie Leslie, October 27, 2011, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “Losing a job is a quick and certain path to economic distress, as all too many Georgians have learned in recent years. But new census data highlight another, deeper-seated trend with profound implications for the long-term prosperity of middle-class families: the disappearance of marriage as a norm, especially among those who have children. In Georgia, from 2008 to 2010, the poverty rate was higher among single women raising children than among the unemployed — 39 percent vs. 31 percent — according to an Atlanta Journal-Constitution analysis of 3-year census estimates released Thursday…”

• Many who started in middle class find lifestyle slipping away, By Aldo Svaldi, October 23, 2011, Denver Post: “Joanne Spillman, 50, grew up in a large home in Denver’s Park Hill neighborhood, never wanting for anything, and never anticipating she would achieve anything less in her life. ‘We were middle class, and our needs were met,’ Spillman said. ‘I always figured I would grow up and live the same lifestyle.’ But Spillman has struggled her whole adult life to reach the standard of living she once knew, a struggle that the recession and weak recovery have made much tougher. Nearly three out of 10 Americans, 28 percent, born in the middle class drop out of it as adults, according to a recent study on economic mobility from The Pew Charitable Trusts. The study defines middle class as those families making between $32,900 and $64,000 in 2010 dollars, which ranks between the 30th and 70th percentiles of income. The 30th percentile was used as a cut-off point because it is where families typically stop relying on government support to get by, said Erin Currier, project manager for Pew’s Economic Mobility Project…”
• Census: Share of Americans on the move falls to record low amid long-term housing and job woes, Associated Press, October 26, 2011, Washington Post: “Yet another symptom of the economic downturn: Americans aren’t moving. Young adults are staying put, often with their parents. Older people aren’t able to retire to beachfront or lakeside homes. U.S. mobility is at its lowest point since World War II. New information from the Census Bureau highlights the continuing impact of the housing bust and unemployment on U.S. migration, after earlier signs that mobility was back on the upswing. It’s a shift from America’s long-standing cultural image of ever-changing frontiers, dating to the westward migration of the 1800s and more recently in the spreading out of whites, blacks and Hispanics in the Sun Belt’s housing boom. Rather than housing magnets such as Arizona, Florida and Nevada, it is now more traditional, densely populated states - California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey - that are showing some of the biggest population gains in the recent economic slump, according to the data released Thursday…”

• Utah has nation’s lowest ‘income inequality’, By Lee Davidson, October 26, 2011, Salt Lake Tribune: “More than any other Americans, Utahns live among neighbors whose incomes are similar to their own. The rich live with the rich, and the poor with the poor. But the overall range of Utahns’ household incomes is relatively narrow, too, with comparatively few who are exceptionally high- or low-income. That’s according to a report released Wednesday by the U.S. Census Bureau looking at ‘neighborhood income inequality’ between 2005 and 2009…”
• Income inequality lower than average in NW, says Census report, By Jessica Robinson, October 26, 2011, Oregon Public Broadcasting: “New numbers show the gap between the rich and poor has grown across the nation. But income inequality in the Northwest is lower than the national level. That’s according to an analysis released Wednesday by the U.S. Census Bureau. Correspondent Jessica Robinson has more. The report is based on survey data collected between 2005 and 2009 — three years of economic growth, plus two years of recession. It uses three different measurements. And in all of them, Oregon, Idaho and Washington have lower-than-average levels of income inequality. That is, the spread between high wage earners and low wage earners…”
• Top earners doubled share of nation’s income, study finds, By Robert Pear, October 25, 2011, New York Times: “The top 1 percent of earners more than doubled their share of the nation’s income over the last three decades, the Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday, in a new report likely to figure prominently in the escalating political fight over how to revive the economy, create jobs and lower the federal debt. In addition, the report said, government policy has become less redistributive since the late 1970s, doing less to reduce the concentration of income…”
• The rich are getting richer, U.S. study says, By Jim Puzzanghera, October 27, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “The rich got richer over the last three decades - and the very rich got very much richer - according to a new government study. The top 1% of households saw their after-tax incomes grow by 275% from 1979 to 2007, said the study by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. That was more than quadruple the growth of the rest of the top 20% of the population during that period. Meanwhile, income for the 60% of households that make up the middle of the income scale increased by slightly less than 40%, the study found. The poor - the 20% of the population with the lowest incomes - saw just an 18% increase…”

State minimum wage rates to go up with inflation in 2012, By Pamela M. Prah, October 14, 2011, Stateline.org: “Increases in the minimum wage often involve protracted political battles, but no so for 10 states that will increase their rates in 2012. That’s because these states tie annual increases in their minimums to increases in the cost of living. The minimum wage will increase by 28 cents next year in Colorado; 30 cents in Montana, Ohio and Oregon; and 37 cents in Washington State. Other states that have laws requiring their minimum wages be adjusted annually are Arizona, Florida, Missouri, Nevada and Vermont. Announcements regarding rate increases in those states are still to come. Nationwide, 18 states and Washington, D.C. have minimum wage rates that are higher than the federal minimum wage of $7.25, according to U.S. Labor Department data. Washington State has the highest hourly rate at $8.67, which will go to $9.04 next year when the new rate goes into effect…”

Recession officially over, U.S. incomes kept falling, By Robert Pear, October 9, 2011, New York Times: “In a grim sign of the enduring nature of the economic slump, household income declined more in the two years after the recession ended than it did during the recession itself, new research has found. Between June 2009, when the recession officially ended, and June 2011, inflation-adjusted median household income fell 6.7 percent, to $49,909, according to a study by two former Census Bureau officials. During the recession - from December 2007 to June 2009 - household income fell 3.2 percent. The finding helps explain why Americans’ attitudes toward the economy, the country’s direction and its political leaders have continued to sour even as the economy has been growing. Unhappiness and anger have come to dominate the political scene, including the early stages of the 2012 presidential campaign…”

Study: Worst hospitals treat larger share of poor, By Carla K. Johnson (AP), October 5, 2011, Salt Lake Tribune: “The nation’s worst hospitals treat twice the proportion of elderly black patients and poor patients than the best hospitals, and their patients are more likely to die of heart attacks and pneumonia, new research shows. Now, these hospitals, mostly in the South, may be at higher risk of financial failure, too. That’s because the nation’s new health care law punishes bad care by withholding some money, says the lead author of the study published Wednesday in the journal Health Affairs…”

Low-income borrowers get options beyond payday loans, By Christine Dugas, September 29, 2011, USA Today: “As more and more Americans rely on costly, non-traditional ways to borrow money, companies are starting to step up to provide safer, more affordable financial tools. Some 9 million families don’t have a bank account. And many of those who do have an account still consider themselves financially frail. Almost half of all households say they wouldn’t be able to come up with funds to deal with a financial shock of $2,000, says Annamaria Lusardi at George Washington University School of Business…”

N.J. ranks 46th nationally for participation in the National School Breakfast Program, By Nic Corbett, September 30, 2011, Star-Ledger: “A bowl of cereal, a cup of milk and some graham crackers can help a student start the school day off right, but New Jersey ranks 46th in the nation for participation in the National School Breakfast Program. Only 28 percent of New Jersey children eligible for free- or reduced-price meals were served breakfast at school last year through the federally funded program, according to a report by the nonprofit Advocates for Children of New Jersey using data from the New Jersey Departments of Education and Agriculture. Executive Director Cecilia Zalkind said it’s difficult for students to concentrate on a reading assignment or solve a math problem without eating in the morning…”

• Poverty affects 46 million Americans, By Marisol Bello, September 28, 2011, USA Today: “Billy Schlegel plunged from middle class into poverty in the time it took his daughter to play a soccer season. In January 2010, he was making $50,000 a year as a surveyor, meeting the mortgage payments on his three-bedroom home in the nation’s wealthiest county and paying for his children to play hockey and soccer. Then came February. Schlegel, 45, was laid off. During the next 18 months, the divorced father of three almost lost his house, had to stop paying child support and turned to the local food bank for basic necessities. ‘You’ve got to swallow your pride,’ Schlegel says. ‘Especially around here, people lose their status and they feel they don’t fit in.’ This is the face of poverty after the Great Recession. Millions of Americans such as Schlegel now find themselves among the suddenly poor…”
• Hispanic children in poverty exceed whites, study finds, By Sabrina Tavernise, September 28, 2011, New York Times: “Hispanic children living in poverty in the United States outnumber poor white children for the first time, a demographic shift that was hastened by the recession, according to a report released Wednesday by the Pew Hispanic Center. The number of Hispanic children in poverty jumped by 36 percent from 2007 to 2010, to a total of 6.1 million, compared with 5 million non-Hispanic white children who are poor, said the report, which analyzed recent data from the Census Bureau. The recession drove the rise, the report found. But demographics also contributed. The Hispanic population has grown by more than 40 percent over the past decade…”
• Hispanic kids the largest group of children living in poverty, By Carol Morello and Ted Mellnik, September 28, 2011, Washington Post: “Hispanics now make up the largest group of children living in poverty, the first time in U.S. history that poor white kids have been outnumbered by poor children of another race or ethnicity, according to a new study. In a report released Wednesday, the Pew Hispanic Center said that 6.1 million Hispanic children are poor, compared with 5 million non-Hispanic white children and 4.4 million black children. Pew said Hispanic poverty numbers have soared because of the impact of the recession on the growing number of Latinos…”

• Most food stamp recipients have no earned income, By Sara Murray, September 26, 2011, Wall Street Journal: “Some 70% of households that relied on food stamps last year had no earned income, a new report shows. More than 40 million individuals and nearly 19 million households tapped the food stamp program in 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. While the recession technically ended in 2009, a sluggish economic recovery left millions out of work or underemployed and leaning on the government for assistance last year…”
• $7M plan may save the state $130M, By Catherine Candisky, September 29, 2011, Columbus Dispatch: “The state hopes to avoid $130 million in federal penalties by giving working-poor families $10 a month in food stamps. Federal regulators recently levied nearly $33 million in fines against Ohio for having too few welfare recipients working or training for a job. Desperate to avoid that fine and another $100 million in pending fines, state officials announced their plan for boosting the so-called work-participation rate - padding the rolls. The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services says that among its initiatives is temporarily adding more poor families - with jobs - to public-assistance rolls so they can be counted in the state’s work-participation rate…”

• Mobile poverty jumps almost 2 percent; poverty rises elsewhere in Alabama, September 23, 2011, Mobile Press-Register: “American Community Survey 1-year estimates released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau show that poverty in the Mobile metropolitan area rose from 18.4 percent in 2009 to 20.2 percent in 2010 — almost a 2-percent jump. During the same period, median household income in the Mobile metro fell from $40,407 in 2009 to $39,998 in 2010…”
• Of big cities, Valley had 3rd-largest job-loss rate, By Ronald J. Hansen, September 22, 2011, Arizona Republic: “The Phoenix area from 2008 to 2010 suffered one of the worst declines among the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan areas in the percentage of working-age people with a job, according to newly released Census Bureau data. As of last summer, the Phoenix area also was near the bottom of the largest markets in the share of its population that held a job, at 65.6 percent. Nine metro areas had lower figures, and three others matched Phoenix’s percentage. The annual Census Bureau estimates, which also included worsening numbers for household income and poverty rate, portray a region that has fared worse than the nation as a whole in the aftermath of the Great Recession…”
• Census calls Memphis poorest in nation, By Tom Charlier, September 23, 2011, Memphis Commercial Appeal: “With nearly one in five residents stuck below the poverty line, metropolitan Memphis ranks as by far the most impoverished large metro area in the nation, new census figures show. Of the 1.3 million people in the eight-county metro area, an estimated 246,265 — 19.1 percent — lived in poverty last year, according to figures released Thursday from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey…”
• Child poverty rate in Connecticut cities hits ‘alarming’ rate, census data shows, By Angela Carter, September 22, 2011, Middletown Press: “Connecticut workers earn a median income of $40,478 in an environment where income is falling among all groups and cities are facing ‘alarming’ child poverty rates, according to the American Community Survey, released Thursday by the Census Bureau. The American Community Survey is an annual survey between decennial Census counts in geographic areas in the United States with a population of 65,000 or more…”
• Poverty pervades the suburbs, By Tami Luhby, September 23, 2011, CNNMoney.com: “Guess where most people in poverty live? Hint: It’s not in the inner cities or rural America. It’s in the idyllic suburbs. A record 15.4 million suburban residents lived below the poverty line last year, up 11.5% from the year before, according to a Brookings Institution analysis of Census data released Thursday. That’s one-third of the nation’s poor. And their ranks are swelling fast, as jobs disappear and incomes decline amid the continued weak economy. Since 2000, the number of suburban poor has skyrocketed by 53%, battered by the two recessions that wiped out many manufacturing jobs early on, and low-wage construction and retail positions more recently…”
• Census report shows Greater Cleveland families are feeling the sting of a lost decade, By Robert L. Smith, September 22, 2011, Cleveland Plain Dealer: “Some economists are referring to the last 10 years as the ‘lost decade’ and no doubt tens of thousands of Greater Clevelanders feel something critical has been missing. That something is income. A new report from the U.S. Census Bureau confirms that the region is deeply embedded in a gloomy national trend, one that has seen middle-class incomes steadily erode…”
• Census shows rise in N.Y. poverty, By Joseph Spector, September 22, 2011, Ithaca Journal: “New York’s poverty rate rose 5 percent between 2009 and 2010, while home values and median household income fell slightly, according to U.S. Census Bureau data released Thursday. The data shows how New York, as well as the nation, continues to struggle through a difficult economic period. People living in poverty in New York — which is categorized as a family of four earning less than roughly $22,000 a year — rose from 14.2 percent of households to 14.9 percent between 2009 and 2010, according to the census data…”
• More Rhode Islanders fall below poverty line, By Paul Davis, September 23, 2011, Providence Journal: “Struggling with a lingering recession and high unemployment, more Rhode Islanders fell below the poverty line last year, according to new census figures released Thursday. The poverty rate rose to 14 percent last year from 11.5 percent in 2009, according to 2010 numbers that are part of the American Community Survey. The state’s poverty rate, the highest in New England, is less than the nation’s 15.3-percent rate. After Rhode Island, Maine had the highest poverty rate in New England at 12.9 percent…”
• Census data paints bleak economic picture in Kentucky, By Valarie Honeycutt Spears, September 23, 2011, Lexington Herald-Leader: “New data from the U.S. Census Bureau on Thursday painted a bleak picture of Kentucky’s economic health. Household income is down. Poverty is up. Low-paying jobs are replacing higher-paying jobs. Use of food stamps and publicly funded health care is up. Median household income fell in Kentucky in 2010 from the previous year by $778 and the share of the state’s households that earn annual incomes between $10,000 and $25,000 is increasing, according to the data…”

• Recession’s lost generation: Census finds new lows in mobility, jobs, wedlock for young adults, Associated Press, September 21, 2011, Washington Post: “Young adults are the recession’s lost generation. In record numbers, they’re struggling to find work, shunning long-distance moves to live with mom and dad, delaying marriage and raising kids out of wedlock, if they’re becoming parents at all. The unemployment rate for them is the highest since World War II and risk living in poverty more than others. Data released Thursday from the 2010 census show the wrenching impact of a recession that officially ended in mid-2009…”
• Wisconsin’s median income plummets, census figures show, By Bill Glauber, Ben Poston, Annysa Johnson and Mike Johnson, September 21, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “To all those Wisconsin workers who feel like they’ve been economically squeezed in the first decade of the 21st century: It’s not your imagination. It’s reality. Adjusted for inflation, median household income in the state declined 14.5% between 1999 and 2010, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates released Thursday. The rate of decline in Wisconsin dwarfed the national drop of 8.9% in median household income over the same period…”
• Poverty numbers spike in Milwaukee, By Bill Glauber, Ben Poston, Annysa Johnson and Mike Johnson, September 21, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Poverty has tightened its grip on the city of Milwaukee, flared in Waukesha County and surged statewide, according to startling figures released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau. Milwaukee’s poverty rate was 29.5% last year, up from 27% in 2009. In all, 171,521 people - including nearly half the city’s children - lived below the poverty line in 2010 as Milwaukee remained among America’s 10 most impoverished big cities. In Waukesha County, one of the wealthiest counties in the state, 6.3% of the population was in poverty, up from 4.8% in 2009…”
• One in five New York City residents living in poverty, By Sam Roberts, September 22, 2011, New York Times: “Poverty grew nationwide last year, but the increase was even greater in New York City, the Census Bureau will report on Thursday, suggesting that New York was being particularly hard hit by the aftermath of the recession. From 2009 to 2010, 75,000 city residents were pushed into poverty, increasing the poor population to more than 1.6 million and raising the percentage of New Yorkers living below the official federal poverty line to 20.1 percent, the highest level since 2000. The 1.4-percentage-point annual increase in the poverty rate appeared to be the largest jump in nearly two decades…”
• Poverty rate rose in Philadelphia from 2009 to 2010, By Alfred Lubrano, September 22, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “The poverty rate in Philadelphia jumped nearly two percentage points from 2009 to 2010, according to a federal report released Thursday, underscoring the growing plight of residents being swamped by unemployment and hard times…”
• 1 in 4 Baltimore residents living in poverty, By Steve Kilar, September 22, 2011, Baltimore Sun: “About one in four Baltimore residents is living in poverty, a one-year increase of more than 20 percent, according to estimates released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau. Although the recession officially ended in June 2009, a federal survey conducted last year shows that the downturn’s enduring effects have led poverty rates to skyrocket over a short period. The uptick is straining government and charitable resources and leaving Baltimore leaders scrambling for solutions…”
• Census: More residents sinking into poverty, By Jack Broom and Justin Mayo, September 21, 2011, Seattle Times: “Household income - in Washington state and across the country - declined in 2010, while the percentage of people living in poverty increased, as did the numbers of people without health insurance, according to data being released Thursday by the Census Bureau…”
• More in Michigan fall into poverty, By Mike Wilkinson and Serena Maria Daniels, September 22, 2011, Detroit News: “Just as the nation was declaring the recession officially over last year, the landscape in Michigan was far from rosy: The poverty rate in 2010 was its highest in at least four decades, and incomes continued to fall as the economic shift away from manufacturing continued, new census data released this morning shows. The data reveals problems that could grow worse with plans to cut aid to the poor while also slashing spending on higher education, one of the surest ways to avoid poverty…”
• Metro Detroit schools see surge in number of kids living in poverty, By Lori Higgins, September 22, 2011, Detroit Free Press: “More of the children attending schools in metro Detroit are living in poverty, a trend pronounced not just in urban areas but also in some of the tri-county’s wealthier areas. Between 2006 and 2010 — a period marked by a recession that rocked Michigan more than most states — 19 school districts in Macomb, Oakland and Wayne counties saw increases of more than 100% in the number of poor children. Some of it can be tied to low-income families moving into wealthier districts as they look for better schools. But mostly, school officials say, it’s homegrown, with local parents falling into poverty after losing jobs or dealing with pay cuts…”
• Census survey data: Minn. income continued downward slide in 2010, By Elizabeth Dunbar, September 21, 2011, Minnesota Public Radio: “Minnesotans’ income took another hit in 2010, and the poverty rate edged up, according to new American Community Survey data released Thursday. Median household income fell from about $56,600 in 2009 to about $55,500 in 2010, with inflation already taken into account. Since 2007, median income has dropped by about 5 percent in Minnesota. The poverty rate increased from 11 percent to 11.6 percent from 2009 to 2010, and the uptick was even more pronounced among children: 15.2 percent in 2010 compared to 14.1 percent in 2009…”
• Poverty extends reach across St. Louis region, By Doug Moore, September 22, 2011, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “The recession officially ended two years ago, but the number of people living in poverty here and across the country continues to rise. New data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau show that an additional 19,000 people living in the region’s top six counties plus the city of St. Louis fell into poverty in 2010…”
• More than 1 in 5 Austin residents live in poverty, new census data show, By Juan Castillo, September 22, 2011, Austin American-Statesman: “More people in Austin lived in poverty, were on food stamps and saw their median family household incomes shrink in 2010, according to new census data out today depicting the growing toll of the weakened economy in Central Texas and across the state. About 18 percent of all Texans lived in poverty in 2010, more than 3 percentage points above the national average…”
• Census: City lags in education, By Jeannie Kever, September 21, 2011, Houston Chronicle: “Houston faces sharp divisions over education and opportunity, according to Census data released today. More than one in four adults - and more than 40 percent of Hispanics - don’t have a high school diploma. That’s higher than the state average, and far higher than the national average of 14.4 percent. On the other hand, more than 28 percent of Houston residents have at least a bachelor’s degree, slightly higher than the national average and almost 3 percent higher than state figures…”

• Poor are still getting poorer, but downturn’s punch varies, Census data show, By Jason DeParle and Sabrina Tavernise, September 15, 2011, New York Times: “The discouraging numbers spilling from the Census Bureau’s poverty report this week were a disquieting reminder that a weak economy continues to spread broad and deep pain. And so it does. But not evenly. The Midwest is battered, but the Northeast escaped with a lighter knock. The incomes of young adults have plunged - but those of older Americans have actually risen. On the whole, immigrants have weathered the storm a bit better than people born here. In rural areas, poverty remained unchanged last year, while in suburbs it reached the highest level since 1967, when the Census Bureau first tracked it. Yet one old problem has not changed: the poor have rapidly gotten poorer. The report, an annual gauge of prosperity and pain, is sure to be cited in coming months as lawmakers make difficult decisions about how to balance the competing goals of cutting deficits and preserving safety nets…”
• Health insurance, poverty: Numbers of poor, uninsured increase, census figures show, By Jeff Kunerth and Kate Santich, September 13, 2011, Orlando Sentinel: “More than 46.2 million Americans live in poverty - the highest number in the 52 years for which such estimates have been published, according to census figures released Tuesday. From 2009 to 2010, the nation’s poor increased by 2.6 million, and the number of those without health insurance grew by nearly 1 million people. In Florida, 3.8 million people - more than one in five - were without health insurance last year. Nationwide, the number of uninsured was closer to one in six. Census officials attributed the increase in poverty to the high numbers of unemployed Americans…”

Minimum wage to rise, By Ilene Aleshire, September 16, 2011, Eugene Register-Guard: “Oregon’s minimum wage will go up 30 cents per hour, to $8.80, next year, state Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian announced Thursday. The increase mirrors a 3.77 percent increase in the Consumer Price Index since August 2010, Avakian said. ‘Safeguarding the wages of low-income workers is especially critical in a tough economy,’ Avakian said in a statement. ‘Oregon’s economy will not rebound if we allow 144,538 minimum wage earners to fall behind inflation.’ Oregon’s current minimum wage is the second-highest among all 50 states, behind only to Washington state’s $8.67, according to the nonpartisan Oregon Center for Public Policy. Washington will announce its 2012 minimum wage on Sept. 30, Avakian said…”

• U.S. poverty totals hit a 50-year high, By Don Lee, Noam Levey and Alejandro Lazo, September 14, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “In a grim portrait of a nation in economic turmoil, the government reported that the number of people living in poverty last year surged to 46.2 million - the most in at least half a century - as 1 million more Americans went without health insurance and household incomes fell sharply. The poverty rate for all Americans rose in 2010 for the third consecutive year, matching the 15.1% figure in 1993 and pushing many more young adults to double up or return to their parents’ home to avoid joining the ranks of the poor. Taken together, the annual income and poverty snapshot released Tuesday by the U.S. Census Bureau underscored how the recession is casting a long shadow well after its official end in June 2009…”
• Young people hit hard as U.S. poverty rate increases to 15.1 percent, By Matt O’Brien, September 13, 2011, San Jose Mercury News: “Joblessness pushed an additional 2.6 million people into poverty last year as 15.1 percent of Americans and 16.3 percent of Californians were living under the poverty line — the highest rate since 1993, according to 2010 U.S. census statistics released Tuesday. ‘I never thought it was going to be this bad,’ said Celina Lopez, a single mother of two young children who has moved in with her grandmother in El Sobrante. ‘My situation is pretty scary, in terms of housing, kids and being able to provide for them. I didn’t think it would be this hard to find a job.’ The national poverty rate rose from 14.3 percent in 2009, and it increased most dramatically for children and the youngest working-age adults, those from 18 to 24…”
• Census figures show record numbers of Americans in poverty, By Alfred Lubrano, September 14, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Stymied by a relentlessly dismal economy, more Americans were in poverty in 2010 than at any other time since poverty levels were first published 52 years ago, new government figures show. Overall, 46.2 million Americans lived in poverty in 2010, up from 43.6 million in 2009. The poverty standard for a family of four is an annual income of $22,113. The poverty rate last year was 15.1 percent, compared with 14.3 percent in 2009. It was the highest rate in 17 years, according to U.S. Census figures released Tuesday…”
• Government aid keeps millions out of poverty, By Tami Luhby, September 14, 2011, CNNMoney.com: “Without help from the federal government, millions more people would have sunk below the poverty line in 2010, U.S. Census data shows. Unemployment insurance helped keep 3.2 million Americans out of poverty in 2010, according to new statistics released Tuesday. Without this vital lifeline, which lasts up to 99 weeks, these jobless folks would have joined the roughly 46.2 million people now considered in poverty. Other government assistance programs, such as food stamps, also provided much-needed support to the poor. But because the Census Bureau’s official poverty statistics don’t consider these income sources, they were not taken into account when determining whether a person fell below the line, which is $22,314 for a family of four. However, the Census Bureau does calculate what impact this assistance would have had if it were measured…”
• Rising poverty rate shows holes in safety net, By John W. Schoen, September 13, 2011, MSNBC.com: “The worst economic downturn since the 1930s has left a record number of Americans in poverty and created strains on the government’s safety net not seen in decades, according to a report issued Tuesday by the U.S. Census Bureau. ‘Clearly the safety net has helped, but it’s got holes in it,’ said Jared Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and former White House economist. With the unemployment rate stuck stubbornly over 9 percent, the poverty rate in the United States climbed to 15.1 percent last year - the highest level since 1993 - as the number of impoverished Americans swelled to a record 46.2 million, the Census report said…”
• Poverty rate rises, especially for Hispanics, By Schuyler Velasco, September 13, 2011, Christian Science Monitor: “More Americans are living in poverty than ever before - and for Hispanics, the trends are especially bleak. Their poverty rate went up 1.3 percent in 2010, the sharpest annual rise of any group except blacks. More than a quarter of Hispanics - some 13.2 million people - were living below poverty level, more than double the 9.9 percent rate of non-Hispanic whites, according to a new report from the US Census Bureau. The median household income for Hispanics dropped from $38,667 to $37,759 - a decrease of 2.3 percent…”

• U.S. Poverty rate, at 15 percent, is the highest since 1993, By Sabrina Tavernise, New York Times: “The percentage of Americans living in poverty last year rose to the highest level since 1993, the Census Bureau reported Tuesday, fresh evidence that the disappointing economic recovery has done nothing for the country’s poorest citizens. Another 2.6 million people slipped below the poverty line in 2010, meaning 46.2 million people now live in poverty in the United States, the highest number in the 52 years the Census Bureau has been tracking it, said Trudi Renwick, chief of the Poverty Statistic Branch at the Census Bureau. That figure represented 15.1 percent of the population, up from 14.3 percent in 2009, and 11.7 percent at the beginning of the decade in 2001. The poverty line in 2010 for a family of four was $22,113…”
• U.S. poverty rate reaches 15.1 percent, By Michael A. Fletcher, September 13, 2011, Washington Post: “The nation’s poverty rate spiked to 15.1 percent in 2010, the highest level since 1993, the Census Bureau reported on Tuesday, providing vivid new evidence about the country’s inability to escape the lingering effects of the recession. About 46.2 million Americans lived in poverty last year, marking an increase of 2.6 million over 2009 and the fourth consecutive annual increase in poverty…”
• U.S. Poverty rate up, household income down, By Arlette Saenz, September 13, 2011, ABC News: “An estimated 46.2 million Americans lived in poverty last year, or 15.1 percent, the highest rate since 1993, new data from the Census Bureau released today showed. Median household income declined at the same time and the number of people without health insurance coverage rose, highlighting the consequences of the recent recession…”
• Household income falls, poverty rate rises, By Conor Dougherty, September 13, 2011, Wall Street Journal: “The income of the average American worker-long the envy of much of the world-has dropped for the third year in a row and is now roughly where it was in 1996, adjusted for inflation. The U.S. poverty rate, meanwhile, has continued to rise. America’s median household income-what the statistical middle of the pack earns in a year-fell 2.3% to $49,445, adjusted for inflation, according to the Census Bureau’s annual snapshot of living standards. The figure has fallen each year since 2007 as high unemployment and a tougher job market has made it harder for working Americans to get bigger paychecks…”
• Nearly 1 in 6 Americans in poverty, Census says, By Hope Yen (AP), September 13, 2011, Houston Chronicle: “The ranks of the nation’s poor have swelled to a record 46.2 million - nearly 1 in 6 Americans - as the prolonged pain of the recession leaves millions still struggling and out of work. And the number without health insurance has reached 49.9 million, the most in over two decades. The figures are in a Census Bureau report, released Tuesday, that offers a somber snapshot of the economic well-being of U.S. households for last year when joblessness hovered above 9 percent for a second year. The rate is still 9.1 percent at the start of an election year that’s sure to focus on the economy and President Barack Obama’s stewardship of it…”
• Poverty rate rises in America, By Annalyn Censky, September 13, 2011, CNNMoney.com: “Amid a still struggling economy, more people in America fell below the poverty line last year, according to new census data released Tuesday. The nation’s poverty rate rose to 15.1% in 2010, its highest level since 1993. In 2009, 14.3% of people in America were living in poverty…”
• No change in number of uninsured Americans, By Kirsten Stewart, September 13, 2011, Salt Lake Tribune: “The rate of Americans without health insurance held firm last year, propped up by stubbornly high unemployment. From 2009 to 2010 there was no statistically significant change in the number of Americans without coverage, which rose from 49 million to 49.9 million, new census figures show. That’s 16.3 percent, or one out of every five U.S. citizens…”

• Reduced state dental benefits create dire situation for patients, By Anna Gorman, September 12, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “Little surprises Nagaraj Murthy, a dentist in Compton for the past 32 years. He has seen patients who have suffered toothaches for years. Others who haven’t been to the dentist in a decade. Some who can’t chew hard food. But in the two years since California sharply reduced dental benefits for roughly 3 million Medi-Cal recipients, he and other dentists say the situation has become dire for patients who are waiting until their infections land them in an emergency room or their rotted teeth have to be immediately pulled…”
• Lower-income Northern Virginians struggle to get dental care, report finds, By Lena H. Sun, September 7, 2011, Washington Post: “In Northern Virginia, 16 percent of lower-income adults have not gone to a dentist in more than five years, according to a report that looks at disparities in oral health in one of the most prosperous regions in the country. Among lower-income adults who have health coverage, only one-fourth have coverage that includes dental care, compared to 64 percent for higher-income adults. Those were among the key findings in a survey of oral health in Northern Virginia released Thursday. The survey was commissioned by the Northern Virginia Health Foundation, a nonprofit group that focuses on health-care safety nets…”

Unable to pay child support, poor parents land behind bars, By Mike Brunker, September 12, 2011, MSNBC.com: “It may not be a crime to be poor, but it can land you behind bars if you also are behind on your child-support payments. Thousands of so-called ‘deadbeat’ parents are jailed each year in the U.S. after failing to pay court-ordered child support - the vast majority of them for withholding or hiding money out of spite or a feeling that they’ve been unfairly gouged by the courts. But in what might seem like an un-American plot twist from a Charles Dickens’ novel, advocates for the poor say, some parents are wrongly being locked away without any regard for their ability to pay - sometimes without the benefit of legal representation…”

Healthcare costs rose while insurance coverage fell, studies show, By Noam N. Levey, September 8, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “U.S. workers whose wages stagnated over the last decade also saw their health insurance degrade, even as medical costs gobbled up a growing share of their income, two new studies show. An estimated 29 million adults who had health insurance lacked adequate coverage in 2010, leaving them exposed to medical expenses such as high deductibles that they couldn’t afford, according to a survey by the nonprofit Commonwealth Fund. That is up from 16 million underinsured people in 2003, the survey found, underscoring the rising burden that insurance plans are placing on consumers as the industry raises required co-pays and deductibles…”

• Childcare costs force poorest families into debt, September 7, 2001, The Guardian: “Britain’s poorest families are getting into debt because of the high cost of childcare, while a third are turning down jobs and 40% are considering leaving work because they cannot afford to pay for someone to look after their children, according to research. Parents spend almost a third of their incomes on childcare - more than anywhere else in the world, according to a study by Save the Children and the Daycare Trust. For four out of 10 families the cost of childcare is on a par with mortgage or rent payments, the study showed. Of those families in severe poverty, nearly half have cut back on food to afford childcare and 58% said they were, or would be, no better off working once childcare was paid for. The research found that parents, regardless of income, cannot afford not to work but struggle to pay for childcare, and despite many parents cutting back their spending almost a quarter are in debt because of childcare costs…”
• Childcare costs put parents in debt, survey concludes, September 6, 2011, BBC News: “Nearly a quarter of UK parents questioned in a survey by the Daycare Trust and Save the Children say the cost of childcare has put them in debt. The survey of 4,359 parents found 58% had cut spending on other essentials like clothing, heating and other bills. Nearly two-thirds said they could not afford not to work, but struggled to pay for childcare. Four out of 10 families surveyed said the cost of childcare was on a par with their mortgage or rent. The study suggests the cost of childcare has the greatest consequences for the poorest families…”

Many in U.S. slip from middle class, study finds, By Michael A. Fletcher, September 6, 2011, Washington Post: “Nearly one in three Americans who grew up middle-class has slipped down the income ladder as an adult, according to a new report by the Pew Charitable Trusts. Downward mobility is most common among middle-class people who are divorced or separated from their spouses, did not attend college, scored poorly on standardized tests, or used hard drugs, the report says. ‘A middle-class upbringing does not guarantee the same status over the course of a lifetime,’ the report says. The study focused on people who were middle-class teenagers in 1979 and who were between 39 and 44 years old in 2004 and 2006. It defines people as middle-class if they fall between the 30th and 70th percentiles in income distribution, which for a family of four is between $32,900 and $64,000 a year in 2010 dollars. People were deemed downwardly mobile if they fell below the 30th percentile in income, if their income rank was 20 or more percentiles below their parents’ rank, or if they earn at least 20 percent less than their parents. The findings do not cover the difficult times that the nation has endured since 2007…”

Legal aid programs for poor deal with deep cuts, By Elizabeth Crisp, August 29, 2011, USA Today: “Programs that provide free legal aid to the poor are laying off employees, cutting services and increasingly turning away people who need assistance, as slashed budgets face deeper cuts. ‘It’s a really dire situation,’ said Rebekah Diller, deputy director of the justice program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law. ‘Courts around the country are struggling right now with massive amounts of people who have no legal representation.’ Legal aid programs provide representation in civil cases related to domestic violence, foreclosures, child custody issues and similar matters. The Constitution guarantees legal representation if a person cannot afford to hire a lawyer in criminal cases, but in civil cases, people are on their own…”

Unintended pregnancy rate rises among poor women, study says, By Shari Roan, August 24, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “Unintended pregnancies make up almost half of all pregnancies in the U.S. But a new study shows that rates are rising among poor women and declining among women with adequate economic resources. The report, released Wednesday by researchers at the Guttmacher Institute, reviews data from 1994 through 2006. The unintended pregnancy rate among women with incomes below the poverty line rose 50% in that time period. Among higher-income women, the rate fell 29%…”

Many live in poverty in oil country due to high rent, food prices, By Teri Finneman, August 14, 2011, Dickinson Press: “In one of the state’s wealthiest counties, the line of people waiting for the food pantry to open shows another side of the state’s oil boom story. The oil and gas industry has contributed to the state’s nationally known prosperity and created high-paying jobs in western North Dakota. But those who don’t make oilfield wages face the boom’s negative side effects, including the increasing cost of rent, services and goods. ‘I think the common misconception is that since we are in what most people call ‘oil country,’ that everybody is wealthy,’ said Holly Flatau of the Great Plains Food Bank in Fargo. ‘What it’s actually caused is a greater gap in those that are wealthy and those who are not. It’s harder for people that aren’t wealthy to make it on their own…’”

Poverty, academic achievement intertwined, census figures show, By Lynn Moore, August 12, 2011, Muskegon Chronicle: “Many of those who don’t live there - who don’t walk in parents’ and students’ shoes - don’t have a problem beating up on Muskegon Heights schools, especially its high school. Just read the online comments left on stories about the high school’s struggles with academic achievement. Plenty of blame is heaped on parents, students, teachers and administrators. But would they have the same opinion if the topic was the poverty plaguing those families and schools? We’re not talking poor people, but desperately poor. Nearly half of children in the Muskegon Heights school district live in poverty. That would include, for example, a child living with a parent and sibling in a home with an income of no more than $17,285 a year. The question is raised because new data shows academic achievement and poverty are intertwined - not just for Muskegon Heights, but in communities throughout the state. The trend is undeniable when the poverty rates of school districts recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau are placed next to student test scores…”

• Study finds poverty is a high risk factor for AIDS, By Don Sapatkin, August 12, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Poverty, long known to be a major factor behind the HIV epidemic in urban areas, is such a powerful force that income and related measures are better predictors of who will get infected than whether a person exchanges sex for money, according to a new federal study of heterosexuals in 24 cities. The study, published Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was too small to break out findings on Philadelphia or the other cities. But it helps explain why Philadelphia has some of the highest HIV rates in the country, as Philadelphia is among the most impoverished of big cities. The report emphasized that in the communities studied, poverty was more closely linked to HIV than was behavior traditionally seen as driving the epidemic…”
• Poverty a strong factor for HIV in Atlanta and other cities, CDC finds, By Carrie Teegardin, August 11, 2011, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “The HIV infection rate for low-income heterosexuals from Atlanta and 23 other cities is 10 to 20 times higher than the overall rate for the nation, according to a study released Thursday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. People who did not finish high school, were unemployed and had incomes below the poverty line were all significantly more likely to be HIV positive than heterosexuals with higher levels of education and income…”

• New Orleans public school achievement gap is narrowing, By Andrew Vanacore, August 7, 2011, New Orleans Times-Picayune: “For as long as records have been kept, black students in New Orleans’ public schools have lagged far behind the city’s white students on the annual exams that Louisiana uses to track student achievement, reflecting wide income disparities and other factors. What’s more, black students in the city have traditionally fallen behind their black peers in the rest of the state, where the so-called achievement gap has historically been less pronounced. That second metric changed this year for the first time. State data show that 53 percent of African-American youngsters in New Orleans scored at grade level or better on state tests this spring, compared with 51 percent of black students across Louisiana. Just four years ago, only 32 percent of black students in New Orleans had achieved grade level, compared with 43 percent statewide…”
• Huge achievement gaps persist in D.C. schools, By Bill Turque, August 6, 2011, Washington Post: “The gulf in academic achievement separating public schools in the District’s poorest neighborhoods from those in its most affluent has narrowed slightly in some instances but remains vast, an analysis of 2011 test score data show. Children in Ward 7 and 8 schools trailed their Ward 3 peers in reading and math pass rates by huge margins - from 41 to 56 percentage points - on this year’s D.C. Comprehensive Assessment System exams. The tests are given annually to students in grades 3 through 8 and 10…”

Regulators say low-income phone program is hemorrhaging millions, By Fred Hiers, August 2, 2011, Ocala Star-Banner: “Federal and state regulators are working to fix a program they believe is making millions of dollars in unauthorized payments to low-income phone customers. Lifeline is a federal program, paid for by all phone users, which subsidizes low-income people in order to help pay for their phone installations and use. The limit is one phone. The subsidy goes to the phone service provider. The annual subsidy for customers is nearly $162 per year. According to a Florida Public Service Commission report, 642,129 Floridians were subscribing to the program as of June 20, 2010. Other states also administer the program. The problem is, some customers are receiving payments for more than one phone, regulators say…”

• Study: Income does not explain segregation patterns in housing, By Carol Morello, August 1, 2011, Washington Post: “Affluent blacks and Hispanics live in neighborhoods that are noticeably poorer than neighborhoods where low-income whites live, according to a new study that suggests income alone does not explain persistent segregation patterns in housing. Washington and Atlanta were the only two major metropolitan regions in the country that followed a slightly different pattern. In these two cities, the study found that the situation for high-income blacks and Hispanics was equal, but not worse, than that of low-income whites…”
• Richer minorities seen living in poorer neighborhoods, By Haya El Nasser, August 2, 2011, USA Today: “The most successful blacks and Hispanics are more likely to have poor neighbors than are whites, according to a new analysis of Census data. The average affluent black and Hispanic household - defined in the study as earning more than $75,000 a year - lives in a poorer neighborhood than the average lower-income non-Hispanic white household that makes less than $40,000 a year…”

• Big retailers make pledge of stores for ‘food deserts’, By Sean Collins Walsh, July 20, 2011, New York Times: “Executives from Wal-Mart, Walgreens, SuperValu and other stores joined Michelle Obama at the White House on Wednesday to announce a pledge to open or expand a combined 1,500 stores in communities that have limited access to nutritious food and are designated as ‘food deserts.’ With the pledges, secured by the Partnership for a Healthier America, which is part of Mrs. Obama’s campaign to reduce childhood obesity, the stores aim to reach 9.5 million of the 23.5 million Americans who live in areas where finding affordable healthy foods can be difficult. In those areas, many people turn to fast food restaurants or convenience stores…”
• First lady, grocers vow to build stores in ‘food deserts’, By Yian Q. Mui, July 20, 2011, Washington Post: “Supermarkets joined with first lady Michelle Obama on Wednesday in a pledge to build stores in poor neighborhoods that have historically lacked access to fresh groceries, part of her signature effort to combat childhood obesity. Participating retailers include Wal-Mart, the country’s largest grocer, Walgreens and Supervalu and regional supermarkets such as Brown’s Super Stores in Philadelphia and Calhoun Foods in Alabama and Tennessee. Together, they promised to open more than 500 stores that will employ tens of thousands of people…”

• Poverty study: 1 in 3 Michigan senior citizens struggles with money, By Robin Erb, July 20, 2011, Detroit Free Press: “A third of Michigan’s seniors are considered ‘economically insecure’ - far more than the federal poverty limits would suggest, according to a new study. Moreover, even in counties that are home to some of the most affluent suburbs where the wealthiest will buoy the overall median household income, at least one in four seniors on the other end of the economic scale struggles to make ends meet, according to the paper, ‘Invisible Poverty: New Measure Unveils Financial Hardship in Michigan’s Older Population…’”
• Study: Third of Lansing-area seniors are struggling financially, By Kathleen Lavey, July 19, 2011, Lansing State Journal: “More than one-third of Michigan’s senior citizens are struggling to pay for food, housing, transportation and medical care they need, according a report to be released today. Those who do not own homes or who rely solely on Social Security payments to live are at much greater risk, says the report by Wayne State University researchers. ‘These numbers are very frightening,’ said Kate White, executive director of Elder Law of Michigan, an advocacy and service group that is releasing the Michigan- focused report today along with the report’s authors…”

Medicare doesn’t cover many health-care expenses for low-income seniors, By N.C. Aizenman, July 18, 2011, Washington Post: “Helen Johnson gave a welcoming smile to the group of older men and women who had assembled at the senior center in the Maryland Eastern Shore town of Snow Hill on a recent evening. All of them were caregivers for spouses or parents with debilitating illnesses. ‘We’re very concerned about you,’ began Johnson, 74, who organizes support programs for a nonprofit agency serving the elderly. ‘You spend so much time tending to your loved ones, you don’t have time for your self.’ But Johnson’s comforting message masked worries of her own. There was the gnawing pain in her arthritic knee, which gets so bad by late afternoon that she can’t stand up for more than a few minutes at a time. There was her dread of the drive home after dark, which has become difficult as her eyesight has weakened. And perhaps most wearying, there was the knowledge that despite her dislike of working evening hours, she had no alternative. Nearly a decade after reaching retirement age and qualifying for Medicare, Johnson cannot afford to give up her job. Even with the paycheck it brings, her income is only a few notches above the federal poverty level…”

Poor often don’t know benefit of banks, By Taryn Luna, July 6, 2011, Boston Globe: “Low-income families use costly check-cashing and loan services not because they lack access to banks, but because they lack knowledge of banking options and their advantages, according to a study by the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. For example, the study found that about one in four low-income residents in the New Bedford area do not have a bank account because they believe they cannot afford it - although most community banks and credit unions offer low-cost or free accounts as required by state law. In addition, the study found, even low-income residents with bank accounts still use check-cashing establishments more than their banks. The study, which surveyed 173 low-income residents in New Bedford, belies perceptions that limited access to banks drives low-income families to use higher-cost alternatives, said Michael Goodman, an associate professor of public policy at UMass Dartmouth who oversaw the study…”

Access to grocers doesn’t improve diets, study finds, By Daniela Hernandez, July 12, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “Better access to supermarkets - long touted as a way to curb obesity in low-income neighborhoods - doesn’t improve people’s diets, according to new research. The study, which tracked thousands of people in several large cities for 15 years, found that people didn’t eat more fruits and vegetables when they had supermarkets available in their neighborhoods. Instead, income - and proximity to fast food restaurants - were the strongest factors in food choice. The results, published Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine, throw some cold water on the idea that lack of access to fresh produce and other healthful foods is a major driver in the disproportionate rates of obesity among the poor, or that simply encouraging grocery chains to open in deprived areas will fix the problem, said study lead author Barry Popkin, director of the Nutrition Transition Program at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill…”

After decades of hard-fought progress, black economic gains were reversed in Great Recession, By Jesse Washington (AP), July 9, 2011, Washington Post: “Growing up black in the segregated 1960s, Deborah Goldring slept two to a bed, got evicted from apartment after apartment, and watched her stepfather climb utility poles to turn their disconnected lights back on. Yet Goldring pulled herself out of poverty and earned a middle-class life - until the Great Recession. First, Goldring’s husband fell ill, and they drained savings to pay for nursing homes before he died. Then Goldring lost her executive assistant job in the Baltimore hospital where she had worked for 17 years. The cruelest blow was a letter from the bank, intending to foreclose on her home of almost three decades. Millions of Americans endured similar financial calamities in the recession. But for Goldring and many others in the black community, where unemployment has risen since the end of the recession, job loss has knocked them out of the middle class and back into poverty. Some even see a historic reversal of hard-won economic gains that took black people decades to achieve…”

As income gap balloons, is it holding back growth?, July 10, 2011, National Public Radio: “Members of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors tend to speak cautiously: Their words can move markets. Yet last month, Fed governor Sarah Bloom Raskin was remarkably candid about the growing gap between America’s rich and poor. ‘This inequality is destabilizing and undermines the ability of the economy to grow sustainably and efficiently,’ she said. Income inequality, she continued, is ‘anathema to the social progress that is part and parcel of such growth.’ The income gap in the United States has ballooned: It’s wider than any time since 1928, in the days before the stock market crash triggered the Great Depression. The numbers are startling: Top CEO salaries were up 23 percent last year, according to the New York Times; the average worker’s pay was up only .5 percent. Meanwhile, the top 0.1 percent of American earners now take in more than 10 percent of the nation’s collective income. That puts the U.S. in the same inequality ballpark as developing countries like Cameroon and Ivory Coast…”

• Income may have impact on waistline, By Danielle Cintron, July 8, 2011, Fargo-Moorhead Forum: “Could the poverty line be affecting the U.S.’s waistline? Those with less education or who make less money continue to have the highest overall obesity rates, according to a study released Thursday by Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. ‘One particular factor is poverty,’ said Jeff Levi, executive director of TFAH. ‘Lower income is associated with higher rates of obesity…’”
• Southerners, poor have highest rates of obesity, By Nanci Hellmich, July 8, 2011, USA Today: “People may still be tightening their belts because of the economy, but too many continue to let them out because of weight gain. The percentage of obese adults increased in 16 states over past year and didn’t decline in any state, a report says. In addition, the number of adults who say they don’t do any physical activity increased in 14 states this past year. ‘The bad news is the obesity rates are really high,’ says Jeff Levi, executive director of the Trust for America’s Health, a non-profit group that prepared the report along with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. ‘But if you are looking for a silver lining it’s that only 16 states showed an increase this last year, and in the past, more states had increases,’ he says…”

• First study of its kind shows benefits of providing medical insurance to poor, By Gina Kolata, July 7, 2011, New York Times: “When poor people are given medical insurance, they not only find regular doctors and see doctors more often but they also feel better, are less depressed and are better able to maintain financial stability, according to a new, large-scale study that provides the first rigorously controlled assessment of the impact of Medicaid. While the findings may seem obvious, health economists and policy makers have long questioned whether it would make any difference to provide health insurance to poor people. It has become part of the debate on Medicaid, at a time when states are cutting back on this insurance program for the poor. In fact, the only reason the study could be done was that Oregon was running out of money and had to choose some people to get insurance and exclude others, providing groups for comparison…”
• Medicaid makes ‘big difference’ in lives, study finds, By Julie Rovner, July 7, 2011, National Public Radio: “As high-level budget talks drag on in Washington, the Medicaid program for the poor remains a prime candidate for cuts. In recent months, Republicans have criticized Medicaid for badly serving its target population. But a new study - the first of its kind in nearly four decades - finds that Medicaid is making a bigger impact than even some of its supporters may have realized. The study, being published as a working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research, has a distinctly bipartisan flavor. Among its authors are Katherine Baicker of Harvard, who was an economic adviser to President George W. Bush, and MIT economist Jonathan Gruber, who has advised the Obama administration…”

Researchers link deaths to social ills, By Nicholas Bakalar, July 4, 2011, New York Times: “Poverty is often cited as contributing to poor health. Now, in an unusual approach, researchers have calculated how many people poverty kills and presented their findings, along with an argument that social factors can cause death the same way that behavior like smoking cigarettes does. In an article published online for the June 16 issue of The American Journal of Public Health, scientists calculated the number of deaths attributable to each of six social factors, including low income…”

Some states still leave low-income students behind; Others make surprising gains, By Sharona Coutts and Jennifer LaFleur, June 30, 2011, ProPublica.org: “Florida is a state of stark contrasts. Travel a few miles from the opulent mansions of Miami Beach and you reach desperately poor neighborhoods. There’s the grinding poverty of sugar cane country and the growing middle class of Jacksonville. All told, half the public-school students in Florida qualify for subsidized lunches. Many are the first in their families to speak English or contemplate attending college. In many states, those economic differences are reflected in the classroom, with students in wealthy schools taking many more advanced courses. But not in Florida. A ProPublica analysis of previously unreleased federal data shows that Florida leads the nation in the percentage of high-school students enrolled in high-level classes-Advanced Placement and advanced math. That holds true across rich and poor districts. Studies repeatedly have shown that students who take advanced classes have greater chances of attending and succeeding in college. Our analysis identifies several states that, like Florida, have leveled the field and now offer rich and poor students roughly equal access to high-level courses…”

More and more Minnesota renters just a heartbeat from homelessness, By Bob Shaw, June 26, 2011, Pioneer Press: “For many Minnesotans, home has never been so hard to pay for. The number of people who can barely afford a place to live has reached an all-time high, creating a new kind of client for homeless shelters - the almost-homeless. ‘I am not a failure,’ said ‘Lovie’ Robinson, 22, as he slumped at a table in the Dorothy Day Center in St. Paul. ‘It’s just that there are not a lot of jobs for people like me.’ Like many of the near-homeless, he goes to the shelter for food and supplies so he can pay his rent. His monthly income is $795, and he pays $600 rent for himself, his 1-year-old daughter and a roommate. ‘I eat a lot of pasta and rice,’ he said. Robinson is one of a growing number of Minnesotans paying more than half their incomes in rent or mortgage payments, regarded as the point at which housing is not affordable. That number spiked to 14 percent in 2009, after decades of hovering near 8 percent…”

Pensions: Low-paid ‘face pension poverty’, ONS says, June 22, 2011, BBC News: “Low earners face ‘potential poverty’ in old age because they are not building up pensions or savings to supplement the state pension, a report has warned. Only 16% of men and 27% of women employed full-time on less than £300 a week are in a pension scheme, said the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Its latest Pension Trends report said that many people are ’stretched’ by the cost of living and are unable to save…”

Budget slashed for jobs for older, low-income workers, By Walker Moskop, June 20, 2001, San Antonio Express-News: “Even with the food stamps she received, Sandy Hipp was barely making enough money when she lived on a minimum-wage salary working 24 hours a week at a senior apartment complex in Seguin. Then, in April, Congress slashed the funding for the program paying her wages, and her hours were cut back to 18. Hipp, 58, said she’ll have to find another job soon and will apply to work at a plant nursery in Seguin. For older, low-income jobseekers, the task of landing work is now a greater uphill climb. The Senior Community Service Employment Program, the national program that gives grants to organizations to train workers, connect them with employers and pay their wages, has seen its budget slashed from $825 million for 2010-11 to $450 million for 2011-12 - a 45 percent cut…”

N.H. fights over minimum wage, By Michael McCord, June 20, 2011, SeacoastOnline: “Gov. John Lynch’s recent veto of a House bill to repeal the state’s minimum wage law created a unique ideological role reversal. Republican House Speaker William O’Brien defended the bill by saying the state should follow federal minimum wage guidelines and the four-term Democratic governor took a state’s rights stand, saying the state should keep its options open…”

Utah: ‘Not even close’ to closing the poverty gap, By Sara Lenz, June 17, 2011, Deseret News: “April Hadley remembers the day she took her oldest daughter Amelia, now 8, to kindergarten at Club Heights Elementary. Her daughter’s teacher commented that it was nice to have a student who came from a two-parent home in her class. ‘It broke my heart,’ Hadley recalled. Over the last few years, the parent of four has questioned her decision to send her children to a school with that dynamic. Eighty percent of the students there qualify for free or reduced lunch, a measure of poverty, and about one in four students at Club Heights is considered a limited English speaker. Many of Hadley’s neighbors have chosen to send their kids to a charter school or another public school. The reason - high poverty schools with a high minority population often don’t perform as well as low poverty schools, and Utah schools are no exception…”

Recession stalls progress on poverty; almost one in 10 Canadians poor: StatsCan, Canadian Press, June 15, 2011, Toronto Star: “The recession stopped progress on poverty in its tracks, according to new data from Statistics Canada that indicates almost one in 10 Canadians is considered poor. In its first detailed, national picture of what happened to income in Canada during the recession, the agency says the poverty rate edged up in 2009 to 9.6 per cent - the second straight year that poverty has grown after more than a decade of steady declines. About 3.2 million people now live in low income, including 634,000 children. Indeed, children were vulnerable during the recession, with their poverty rate rising to 9.5 per cent in 2009 from 9.0 per cent a year earlier. But the picture of the recession is one of stagnation rather than complete catastrophe. The median after-tax income for Canadian families was $63,800 in 2009 - about the same as a year earlier…”

• Study: Preschool boosts low-income students, By Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, June 9, 2011, Chicago Tribune: “A new study revealing the lasting impact of a solid preschool education - especially in disadvantaged communities - was released Thursday, just as Illinois’ governor considers a state budget plan that slashes funding to early childhood programs. While many findings over the years have touted the benefits of starting kids early on the path to education, a study conducted inside Chicago Public Schools and published online by the journal Science shows attending preschool can yield payoffs into adulthood. The report shows that children who attended an established preschool program in Chicago completed high school at higher rates, stayed out of jail, were less likely to abuse drugs or alcohol, and improved their living standards as adults. For 25 years, researchers from the University of Minnesota tracked 1,400 Chicago Public Schools students who attended early childhood programs. They compared those who started preschool at age 3 in Child-Parent Centers, located in or near elementary schools serving low-income students, with those who didn’t attend preschool at all or went to the typical Head Start program…”
• Preschool’s many benefits last into adulthood, according to study of low-income children, By Lindsey Tanner (AP), June 9, 2011, Washington Post: “Preschool has surprisingly enduring benefits lasting well into adulthood, according to one of the biggest, longest follow-up studies of its kind. Better jobs, less drug abuse and fewer arrests are among advantages found in the study that tracked more than 1,000 low-income, mostly black Chicago kids for up to 25 years. Michael Washington was one of them. Now a 31-year-old heating and air conditioning contractor, Washington attended a year of preschool at Chicago’s intensive Child-Parent Center Education Program when he was 4. The ongoing publicly funded program focuses on language development, scholastic skills and building self-confidence. It involves one or two years of half-day preschool, and up to four additional years of educational and family services in grade school. Preschool teachers have college degrees and are certified in early childhood education, and parents are encouraged to be involved in the classes…”

Lynch vetoes bill eliminating state minimum wage law, By Garry Rayno, June 9, 2011, Union Leader: “Gov. John Lynch Thursday vetoed a bill doing away with the state’s minimum wage law which instead tied it to the federal law. In his veto message, Lynch said by repealing the state law, New Hampshire would be ‘effectively ceding state control and authority to the federal government.’ House Bill 133 passed both the House and Senate by more than enough votes to override the governor’s veto. Lynch said the bill would make New Hampshire one of only a handful of states completely deferring to the federal government and not establishing their own minimum wage…”

• Report: Allen County incomes faltering, By Bob Caylor, June 8, 2011, Fort Wayne News-Sentinel: “In many ways, Allen County has been hit harder than the nation or Indiana as a whole by economic decline in the last decade, according to an analysis of the latest census data. Many parts of the information highlighted by the Community Research Institute at IPFW in a report released today are familiar. However, the institute collects and connects census data in a way that clearly shows the challenge confronting the community. There are strengths in Allen County, including population growth that outpaces the state as a whole and a continued advance in many measures of education. But 2010 census data, along with information from the 2005-09 American Community Survey, revealed the continuation of a long trend of median household income dwindling, compared with the nation as a whole…”
• Study: Local incomes slip as economy shifts, By Ron Shawgo, June 8, 2011, Fort Wayne Journal Gazette: “Allen County is growing though incomes have slipped, has mixed educational success among minority groups and more college graduates but relatively few with advanced degrees. The findings are from a new local report that, while sounding some positive notes, expresses concern that black income, for example, has declined sharply compared with white income and poverty rates have increased dramatically among children and older residents. The report, to be released today by the Community Research Institute at IPFW, provides a profile of Allen County using recent census figures…”

‘Perfect storm’ ahead for summer youth programs, By Mary Ann Zehr, May 30, 2011, San Antonio Express-News: “With widespread cutbacks around the country in public funding for both summer school and summer-jobs programs, youths in some cities, such as Los Angeles and Washington, may have plenty of time on their hands in the coming months. Many jobs programs for young people are facing a funding cliff now that federal stimulus money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 has run out. School districts face their own funding cliff with the phasing out of stimulus funds channeled to them through Title I of the No Child Left Behind Act. In addition, the slashing of state budgets has affected both jobs programs and districts’ summer school offerings…”