Skip to main content
University of Wisconsin–Madison
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty

Tag: Poverty

Public Assistance Program Beneficiaries

  • Federal anti-poverty programs primarily help the GOP’s base, By Ronald Brownstein, February 16, 2017, The Atlantic: “Even as congressional Republicans mobilize for a new drive to retrench federal anti-poverty efforts, whites without a college degree—the cornerstone of the modern GOP electoral coalition—have emerged as principal beneficiaries of those programs, according to a study released Thursday morning…”
  • The biggest beneficiaries of the government safety net: Working-class whites, By Tracy Jan, February 16, 2017, Washington Post: “Working-class whites are the biggest beneficiaries of federal poverty-reduction programs, even though blacks and Hispanics have substantially higher rates of poverty, according to a new study to be released Thursday by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities…”

Columbia Daily Tribune Series on Poverty

Left Behind, series homepage, Columbia Daily Tribune: “Poverty does not just affect the poor.  The Left Behind series looks at different aspects of poverty – mobility, crime, education, health care, housing, employment and transportation – and how each affects not only the poor, but the taxpayers of Boone County.  Tribune reporters spent weeks poring over data and talking to Boone County residents about how poverty affects us all…”

American Community Survey

  • Poverty grows in swaths of suburbs, By Christine MacDonald and Mike Martindale, December 8, 2016, Detroit News: “Poverty is growing and incomes are down in pockets of suburban Metro Detroit, according to U.S. Census data released Thursday, but in most of the area’s small cities those numbers have remained stagnant.  Nearly a quarter of Metro Detroit’s smaller communities saw median household income decline and 20 percent saw the poverty rate grow, according to an analysis of census data by The Detroit News. The remaining communities saw no gains or losses and only a handful saw improvements, when comparing two five-year periods, 2006-10 and 2011-15…”
  • Census: Economic data paints two different portraits of Utah, By Daphne Chen, December 7, 2016, Deseret News: “In the remote red mesas of this southeastern corner of Utah, Charlie DeLorme counts the jobs by the single digits.  There’s the Latigo wind farm that started operations last March, creating six new full-time positions.  There’s the Desert Rose Inn in Bluff, which added 10 jobs after a luxury expansion…”
  • Census Bureau surveys highlight growing differences between rural, urban living, By Alan Johnson, December 9, 2016, Columbus Dispatch: “If you live in rural Ohio, you’re more likely than city dwellers to own your home, be a military veteran and be married, the latest report from the U.S. Census Bureau shows.  On the other hand, urban residents’ homes are worth more, and they are more likely to have a college degree and internet access. Rural residents, on average, are slightly older and less likely to be in poverty…”