Calculating poverty in New York: More by city standard, and less by federal one, By Sam Roberts, March 2, 2010, New York Times: “The number of poor people in New York rose by about 300,000, according to a new measure of poverty by the city that takes into account expenses like housing, medical costs and child care that the federal government does not include in its formulation. The increase in poverty under the city’s calculation from 2005 to 2008 contradicts the official federal poverty rate, which showed a decline in New York for the same period, and defied the efforts of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who had made combating poverty a priority of his second term and pioneered the new poverty measurement. City officials said the poverty rate could show a further increase again for 2009 as a result of the recession. Although the recession does not seem to have drained the city of jobs as severely as once feared, about one in five working families failed to earn enough to escape poverty, the city’s analysis found. Many blacks were bumped into lower-paying jobs during the economic slump, and older New Yorkers recorded the highest poverty rates because they were pinched by unreimbursed medical expenses…”
Day: March 3, 2010
State Cuts to Programs for the Poor – Minnesota
- Officials: Public housing would take a hit from Pawlenty’s welfare cuts, By Madeleine Baran, March 3, 2010, Minnesota Public Radio: “After overcoming drug and alcohol addiction two years ago, Gabriella Raspa said her life finally seemed to be headed in the right direction. She was 20, and barely scraping by on $203 a month in welfare payments, but she was getting ready to find a job, and had dreams of going to college to become a journalist. Perhaps most importantly, Raspa said, she had moved into a low-income apartment building in north Minneapolis. She had made friends with other residents, adding that the building was ‘kind of like a dorm, with lots of people my same age. I finally felt like I belonged somewhere.’ But then her welfare benefits abruptly ended. Her doctor said she had sufficiently recovered from her addiction, and was able to work. ‘I kind of freaked out,’ she said. Raspa worried that she would become homeless. She had no income, and didn’t think she’d be able to find a job fast enough to afford her $61 rent payment. Luckily, Raspa said, a caseworker helped her apply for hardship waiver from the public housing authority. The waiver allowed Raspa to stay in her apartment, rent free, until she found a job…”
- Plan offered to break impasse on health care, By Warren Wolfe and Mike Kaszuba, March 2, 2010, Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune: “Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Republican legislative leaders said late Tuesday they have produced a plan to break the impasse over providing health insurance for the state’s poorest and sickest residents. But DFLers and Republicans would not immediately disclose details as they began to analyze its implications. ‘We need more time to think,’ said Sen. Linda Berglin, DFL-Minneapolis, as she emerged Tuesday night from the second of two closed-door sessions in the governor’s office. Berglin, who chairs a key Senate committee, said details could be made public as early as Wednesday and insisted that any plan be subject to a public hearing…”
High School Dropout Rate – Massachusetts
Dropout rate lowest in a decade, March 3, 2010, Boston Globe: “The high school dropout rate in Massachusetts dipped below 3 percent last school year for the first time in a decade, according to a state report released yesterday. The rate of 2.9 percent was a half percentage point lower than the previous year. However, the rate still represents 8,585 students in grades 9-12 who decided to give up on school – a number that state and local educators say is still too high. Mitchell Chester, the state’s commissioner of elementary and secondary education, said that ‘troubling’ gaps still exist between students of different socioeconomic backgrounds, but that every major student group experienced improvements in rates…”