Category: Poverty

Resource Category Topic Type
Southeastern Kentuckians Remain Optimistic Through Great Recession: Growing Concerns about Sprawl, Housing, and Recreational Opportunities
In May and June of 2007, Carsey Institute researchers surveyed 1,000 randomly selected respondents from Kentucky’s Harlan and Letcher counties, and between November 2010 and January 2011, they returned to survey 1,020 different randomly selected respondents from the same counties. These two Kentucky counties provide a snapshot of perceptions of community and environmental change in a chronically poor rural place. This brief focuses on the questions asked in both surveys to identify area wide (Harlan and Letcher counties combined) changes since the Great Recession. The surveys reveal that the recession has exacerbated concern about many community-level problems including poverty, affordable housing, sprawl, and a lack of recreational opportunities. Southeastern Kentuckians’ views regarding how environmental resources should be used have also changed. As the demand for jobs has increased, Harlan and Letcher county residents are more likely to believe that natural resources should be used for economic development rather than conserved for the future. Optimism about the future is unchanged despite growing financial instability during the recession. Author Jessica Ulrich concludes that as local, state, and federal government program budgets are cut, and poverty and unemployment rates rise, southeastern Kentuckians will need to increasingly rely on the support of other community members. She adds, “If communities keep faith that they can work together to solve pressing problems and obtain the social, human, and economic resources that they desperately need, then perhaps Harlan and Letcher counties can begin to escape from the persistent poverty that has been plaguing them for decades.”
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Community, Economic Development, Housing, Poverty, Public Opinion Publication
State EITC Programs Provide Important Relief to Families in Need
The federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is one of the largest anti-poverty programs in the nation, offering tax credits to low- and moderate-earning families.1 The amount of EITC benefits varies by earnings and the number of dependent children in a family, with considerably more generous benefits going to families with children. In addition to the federal EITC, as of 2015, twenty-six states and the District of Columbia provided additional EITC dollars.2 Most state EITCs are generally structured such that they offer credits equal to a proportion of the federal EITC, varying from 3.5 percent in Louisiana to 40 percent in Washington, DC. This brief documents the estimated effects of state EITC benefits on rates of poverty in 2010–2014 using the Current Population Survey (CPS) Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC). First, we examine Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) rates and average EITC benefits across states with a fully refundable EITC between 2010 and 2014, and estimate how much higher poverty rates would have been in the absence of the state EITC. Next, we analyze how trends in poverty and state EITC benefits vary by race, marital status, metropolitan status, and region among these states. Finally, we project hypothetical differences in poverty rates for non-EITC states had they adopted EITCs of various generosities over this same time period.
Vulnerable Families Research Program Poverty, Safety Net, Tax Publication
Supportive Program Strengths and Gaps for New Hampshire Families
In this brief, authors Sarah Boege and Jess Carson describe child and family program use and gaps among respondents to the 2022 New Hampshire Preschool Development Grant Family Needs Assessment Survey.
Center for Social Policy in Practice, New Hampshire Child Care, Children, Education, Family, Food Assistance, New Hampshire, Poverty, Public Opinion, Safety Net Publication
TANF in Rural America: Informing Re-authorization
In 1996 welfare reform ushered in a new era in which cash assistance for poor parents became both temporary and conditional on activities to promote economic independence through work. Cash assistance from TANF relieves, but does not eliminate, poverty because benefit levels are far too low to lift families above the poverty threshold. These ameliorative effects are weaker in rural than urban areas. Over time, the positive impacts of TANF receipt have continued to decline. The authors assert that the necessity of re-authorizing TANF gives us an opportunity to reflect on its strengths and limitations. TANF is an important component of poor families' budgets. However, in its current form, it is insufficient; strengthening TANF would help alleviate some material hardship in the lives of America's neediest citizens. In order to adapt TANF to better support struggling families in a modern economy, the authors suggest that the TANF reauthorization keep America's rural poor in mind, acknowledge differences in ameliorative effects, re-establish the TANF Emergency Fund, reinvigorate the Contingency Fund, and reconsider TANF Supplemental Grants.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Family, Poverty, Rural, Safety Net Publication
The Unequal Distribution of Child Poverty: Highest Rates among Young Blacks and Children of Single Mothers in Rural America
Measuring by race, place, and family, this brief highlights poverty rates for two rural groups--young black children and children of single mothers--who each face rates around 50%.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Children, Poverty, Rural Publication
Three in Ten Rural and Urban Medicaid Recipients Affected by Potential Work Requirements
The Affordable Care Act in 2010 gave states the option to expand Medicaid access to adults with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. Thus more able-bodied and working adults have become eligible for Medicaid. In addition, several states have petitioned the federal government to have the option to enforce work requirements for those receiving Medicaid in their state.1 Specific waiver requests vary by state, but could have broad implications for Medicaid recipients across the nation, and typically include a requirement of able-bodied, adult Medicaid recipients to complete a certain number of hours spent working, or in some kind of other approved activity, like job training or looking for work. Children under age 19, pregnant or recently postpartum women, people with disabilities, and sole caretakers of young children are typically excluded from these proposed work requirements.
Vulnerable Families Research Program Poverty, Rural, Safety Net, Urban Publication
Toward a More Equal Footing
Policy makers and advocates nationwide recognize that funding for early childhood education is a crucial investment in the future. Critical foundational development occurs before age 5, and research consistently shows that high-quality early education for children leads to higher future educational attainment and lower likelihood of crime,1 and yields a return on investment of 7 to 13 percent.2 Yet accessing affordable, quality early childhood education and care is a challenge for families nationwide. More than a quarter of families with young children are burdened by child care costs,3and the availability and quality of child care and education are highly variable across states.4 One program that connects the most economically vulnerable families with quality early childhood programming is Early Head Start (EHS). Subject to rigorous quality and staffing standards,5 implemented among the youngest children (prenatally through age 2), and delivered via a two-generation approach, EHS is a significant opportunity for providing quality care and education to a population that might otherwise struggle to access it. This brief explores the characteristics of EHS in Maine, compares them to the national landscape, and connects these findings to a discussion of the federal and state policy climates.
Vulnerable Families Research Program Children, Education, Fertility, Poverty Publication
Understanding Very High Rates of Young Child Poverty in the South
It is widely known that the South is home to some of the places with the highest rates of child poverty. To address the many challenges poor families face there, policy makers and community leaders need to understand the complex factors that converge in this region of the United States. This brief presents an analysis of national and state-by-state data to help readers understand high child poverty in the South.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Children, Family, Poverty Publication
Unemployment in the Great Recession: Single Parents and Men Hit Hard
This brief discusses the sweeping impact the Great Recession has had on Americans, particularly men, single parents, young adults, and people with less education. Using data from the 2007 and 2010 Annual Social and Economic Supplement of the Current Population Survey, the authors report that unemployment is highest among men and among unmarried adults, regardless of place or parenting status. Although this was also true before the recession, gaps between men and women, and the unmarried and married, have widened considerably during the recession. Also during the Great Recession, unemployment rose more in central cities and suburban places than in rural places, perhaps because rural unemployment was already high prior to the start of the recession. The authors discuss the need to provide unemployment benefits for individuals experiencing long-term unemployment, and they highlight the importance of programs such as the TANF emergency fund and the Workforce Investment Act. The brief examine changes in unemployment patterns by sex, age, education, race and ethnicity, marital status, and parental status, paying particular attention to differences by place of residence.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Employment, Poverty, Unemployment Publication
Urban and Rural Children Experience Similar Rates of Low-Income and Poverty
Data in this brief shows that the percentages of children living in low-income areas and poverty over the past fifteen years in rural and urban America are converging.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Children, Low Income, Poverty, Rural, Urban Publication
Wanting More but Working Less: Involuntary Part-Time Employment and Economic Vulnerability
Using data from the Current Population Survey, a national survey of U.S. households, this brief outlines a strong association between involuntary part-time employment and economic vulnerability. Author Rebecca Glauber reports that the involuntary part-time employment rate more than doubled between 2007 and 2012.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Employment, Poverty Publication
Young Child Poverty in 2009: Rural Poverty Rate Jumps to Nearly 29 Percent in Second Year of Recession
The U.S. Census Bureau's release of its American Community Survey data in September 2010 illustrated some expected changes in poverty rates in 2009, the second year of the Great Recession. For young children under age 6, living in poverty is especially difficult, given the long-term effects on health and education. Every region of the country except the West saw increases in rural young child poverty in 2009.
 Vulnerable Families Research Program Children, Poverty, Rural Publication