Concentrated Poverty Increased in Both Rural and Urban Areas Since 2000, Reversing Declines in the 1990s
Year: 2017
Type: report
Abstract: In this brief, authors Brian Thiede, Hyojung Kim, and Matthew Valasik discuss changes in poverty levels among U.S. counties using data from the 2000 U.S. Decennial Census and the 2005–2009 and 2011-2015 American Community Surveys. They report that the share of rural counties with high poverty rates (20 percent or more) increased from 20.6 percent in 2000 to 32.5 percent in the aggregate 2011–2015 data, and the share of high-poverty urban counties increased from 6.7 to 15.6 percent. The share of the population living in these high-poverty counties nearly doubled in both rural and urban areas during this period. Substantial increases in concentrated poverty occurred in rural areas both before and after the Great Recession, but increases in urban areas primarily occurred in years during and after the downturn. In rural areas, increases in concentrated poverty were greatest among micropolitan counties with small cities, which had historically been characterized by lower poverty rates than more sparsely populated and isolated areas. Increases in the population exposed to concentrated poverty were greater among the rural non-Hispanic white and black populations than among rural Hispanics. The authors conclude that the overall resurgence of concentrated poverty since 2000 should be of concern to policy makers and other stakeholders since areas with very high poverty rates face many social, economic, and health challenges.
DOI: 10.34051/p/2020.314
Authors: Brian Thiede, Hyojung Kim, Matthew Valasik
Institutions: Pennsylvania State University, Louisiana State University
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
OpenAlex ID: W2770997011