- Arizona’s middle class: Defining American ideal, By Betty Beard, January 23, 2011, Arizona Republic: “America’s middle class has never been easy to define, measure or study. It’s loosely seen as those falling between the impoverished and the rich, the vast group that makes enough money to aspire to the American dream. The dream varies depending on the individual. But generally, “middle class” means enough to live on, with a little bit more. It means in typical times, you can support a household, buy a home and pay a mortgage, afford medical care, help the kids with college costs and plot out a comfortable retirement. With the ‘little bit more,’ you can indulge – an upgraded smartphone, a relaxing vacation, a better car. ‘It’s a headache trying to define,’ said John Russo, of the Center for Working Class Studies at Ohio’s Youngstown State University. It would seem obvious that the middle class could be defined by money – perhaps broadly, such as those between the 20th and 80th percentiles in income, or more narrowly, such as those earning a certain percentage below or above the median income. In Arizona, the median income last year was almost $33,000. But Philadelphia-based economist Joel Naroff said that defining the middle class based solely on income can be misleading…”
- Arizona’s middle class: Poverty casts longer shadow, By Betty Beard, January 24, 2011, Arizona Republic: “Gas prices hover near $3. Medical costs are on the rise, and child care can be expensive. And there’s always an emergency home repair that just wasn’t in the budget. It’s hard to climb back to a middle-class lifestyle after a tumble into joblessness and poverty, as many Arizonans are finding. In September, the U.S. Census Bureau said Arizona had the nation’s second-worst poverty rate in 2009, behind Mississippi. The percentage of impoverished Arizonans was said to have increased to 21 percent in 2009 from 18 percent in 2008. The one-year change highlights the devastating impact of the Great Recession in Arizona, which typically falls in the upper third of the 50 states for high poverty rates. The lower-middle class, in particular, faces a shaky short-term outlook…”
- Arizona’s middle class in crisis: Many are barely hanging on, By Betty Beard, January 23, 2011, Arizona Republic: “Arizonans are coming to terms with a harsh reality: Life is different now. Fundamentally, profoundly different. More than 3 1/2 years after home prices peaked, and three years after the recession began, the economic aftershocks continue. In the job-networking groups and the partially built subdivisions, in the nervous break-room conversations, many middle-class dreams are under siege…”
Tag: Basic needs
UN Rural Poverty Report
Rural areas face challenges to eradicate extreme poverty, By James Melik, December 6, 2010, BBC News: “Some 350 million people living in rural areas being lifted out of extreme poverty in the past decade, according to The Rural Poverty Report, published by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), a United Nations (UN) agency. However, in spite of this, more than a billion people around the world still continue to suffer. The UN describes extreme poverty as living on less than $1.25 (80p) a day. But factors such as human development, a lack of basic needs, vulnerability, livelihood, unsustainability and social exclusion are also considered in the report, which reflects on rural areas across the world and the implications for global food security. The last report came out in 2001 but, according to IFAD’s president Kananyo Nwanze, ideally it should come out more frequently. ‘You shouldn’t have to wait 10 years for a report of this nature,’ he says…”
Report: Cost of Living – California
- Budget project issues ‘Making Ends Meet’ report, By Tom Abate, June 25, 2010, San Francisco Chronicle: “A single adult must earn nearly $32,000 to live in San Francisco, while two working parents with two young children must take in a little more than $84,000 to get by, according to an analysis released Thursday by a public policy group in Sacramento. The California Budget Project report, titled ‘Making Ends Meet,’ estimates the cost of supporting a family of from one person to four people in each of the state’s 58 counties. The study uses federal and state figures to average a range of expenses including housing, utilities, food, transportation, health care, taxes, clothing, laundry services, reading materials and bath products such as toothpaste. ‘We don’t assume any cable TV or smart phone expenses,’ said budget project director Jean Ross, noting that the phone category supposes a $23 a month landline…”
- Many S.J. families struggling, By Jennifer Torres, June 25, 2010, Stockton Record: “More than half of local families – including those whose earnings place them well into middle-income levels – could be struggling to maintain even a modest standard of living (no vacations, no college savings, no home ownership), according to a new analysis that suggests other measures of poverty fail to consider what it really takes to support a family in the state. The California Budget Project, a nonprofit research organization, on Thursday released an update to its periodic report, ‘Making Ends Meet: How much Does it Cost To Raise a Family in California?’ The report offers county-by-county estimates of the child care, transportation, health care, housing and other costs that confront families – and that, in many cases, strain monthly wages. In San Joaquin County, according to the report, a family of four, with two working parents, would need to bring in nearly $5,800 a month, or close to $70,000 annually, to cover basic bills without public assistance…”