- Poverty growing faster in suburbs, By Frank D. Roylance and Larry Carson, January 21, 2010, Baltimore Sun: “The majority of the poor in the Baltimore region now live in the city’s suburbs for the first time, while the poverty rate in the city has declined, a new study has found. The changing geography of poverty here reflects a national trend, and argues for a more regional strategy on issues ranging from social safety nets to mass transit, the study concludes. ‘The notion of poverty as primarily an urban problem is officially outdated,’ said Elizabeth Kneebone, co-author of a report released Wednesday by the Brookings Institution in Washington. ‘This signals a remarkable shift in the geography of American poverty that will ultimately affect the way we think about and approach poverty alleviation strategies.’ Between 2000 and 2008, the number of people living below the federal poverty line in Baltimore’s suburbs grew by nearly 21,000, while the city saw a decline of more than 24,000 poor. The decline in the city’s poverty rate was the third-largest among the 95 cities examined…”
- New report finds suburban poverty rates soaring in downturn, By Tim Logan, January 20, 2010, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “Poverty is moving to the suburbs. And in the recession, it is moving even faster. Those findings are the highlights of a new study out today from the Brookings Institution, which found that the number of people living below the poverty line in American suburbs grew 25 percent in the past eight years, far faster than in central cities that have long housed more than their share of the poor. And it is especially true in St. Louis…”
- Study: More poor living in U.S. suburbs than in cities, By Brandt Williams, January 20, 2010, Minnesota Public Radio: “According to a new study released Wednesday by the Brookings Institution, there are more poor people living in U.S. suburbs than there are in central cities. Researchers say between 2000 and 2008 the number of poor people living in suburban areas grew nearly five times faster than the amount of poor people in the central cities. Brookings researchers say there are now 1.5 million more poor people living in the suburbs than there are in central cities. However, proportionally speaking, poverty is still more prevalent in urban cores…”
Tag: Urban poverty
US Urban and Suburban Poverty Rates
- Study: Poverty in Philadelphia suburbs up nearly 1%, By Alfred Lubrano, January 20, 2010, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Poverty increased nearly 1 percent in Philadelphia’s suburbs between 2000 and 2008, partly because of two recessions, according to a report being released today. Poverty in the suburbs reached a rate of 7.4 percent, compared with 24.1 percent within Philadelphia, according to the report by the Brookings Institution. Citywide poverty increased 1.2 percent between 2000 and 2008, the report showed. Nationwide, suburban poverty increased by 25 percent during that time frame, nearly five times the rate of urban poverty, according to the report…”
- Suburbia home to new poverty challenge, By Bill Zlatos, January 20, 2010, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: “Poverty has crept into bedroom communities around Pittsburgh and across America. A report released today by the Washington, D.C.-based Brookings Institution shows a 25 percent increase in poverty in suburbs — nearly five times the rate in cities. ‘It is disheartening, but not surprising,’ said Diana Bucco, president of The Forbes Funds, a Downtown-based group that assists human service agencies and researches nonprofit organizations. She said residents of older, middle-class communities are coping with flat incomes and rising costs of food, gas, utilities and housing…”
- More than one in four Columbia residents are living in poverty, By James Rosen, January 20, 2010, The State: “More than one of every four Columbia residents is now living in poverty, an increase of more than a quarter of impoverished people than a decade ago. Columbia has been hit harder than other cities in the Carolinas, but Charleston, Raleigh and urban centers are also home to a growing number of poor people. The new study by the Brookings Institution, a Washington think thank, looked at Census Bureau data for the country’s 95 largest urban areas, which the U.S. government calls Metropolitan Statistical Areas. The worst recession in two decades has sent family incomes plummeting in cities across the nation, from Hartford, Conn. – where two in five people live in poverty – to Youngstown, Ohio, and Detroit in the Midwest…”
- National suburban poverty blight skips county, By Rob Varnon, January 20, 2010, Danbury News Times: “A wall of wealth in the suburbs of Bridgeport and Stamford appears to have staved off the ravages of poverty sweeping through hinterlands in other states. The Brookings Institution says in a new report today that 9.5 percent of the suburban U.S. population lived below the poverty line in 2008, while suburban Fairfield County had a poverty rate of just 5 percent. ‘The suburban poor has held pretty steady’ in Fairfield County, said Brookings Senior Research Analyst Elizabeth Kneebone, the study’s lead author. The county has the second lowest suburban poverty rate in the nation…”
Poverty Rates in US Cities
America’s 10 poorest cities, By Joshua Zumbrun, October 19, 2009, ABC News: “The Great Recession is rewriting the rules of American poverty. Data from the Census Bureau, released in September, show that during the first year of the recession, incomes fell farther and poverty leaped higher than during almost any other time in a generation. In 2008, U.S. median income fell to $50,303 from $52,163 in 2007. That 3.6% decline is the largest one-year drop since records begin. The poverty rate increased to 13.2% from 12.5%, meaning the recession has brought 2.6 million more Americans into poverty. The Economic Policy Institute projects that in the next two years, incomes could decline by another $3,000 and poverty could increase by 1.9 percentage points. Just as the recession has changed the map of unemployment, it has redrawn the contours of poverty…”