Blog#9: 30 million Americans on the edge of poverty

According to Yahoo News, more than 30 million Americans are living just above the poverty line. These near poor, often defined as having incomes of up to 1.5 times the poverty threshold, were supporting a family of four on no more than $34,500 last year. According to CNNMoney they are more likely to be white than those in poverty, through a Census Bureau data. They are more likely to be elderly and more than three times as likely to work full-time, year-round. The worst part of all is knowing that they are more likely not to receive help from the government. "People just above the poverty line are just one paycheck or health disaster away from poverty," said Katherine Newman, a dean at Johns Hopkins University. "They are still quite fragile." According to data, the near poor have grown by about 10% in number over the past five years, as the Great Recession sent many people falling down the income ladder. The ranks of those in poverty, on the other hand, swelled 24% in the same period. The fact that there are more blacks in poverty than among the near poor likely stems from the fact that the unemployment rate among blacks is nearly double that of whites, said Robert Moffitt, professor of economics at Johns Hopkins. And they have much higher rates of single motherhood, he said. Whites, on the other hand, likely have enough earnings to put them just above the poverty line.
After doing some research, I have come to learn that Social Security keeps many of the elderly, particularly white seniors, above the poverty line. So it's not surprising that nearly 40% of the near poor who didn't work are retired, but only 6% say they couldn't find a job. On the flip side, 46% are employed and nearly half are working full-time. The government has been giving some but little assistance through certain programs which help some families remain just above the poverty line. Assistance such as food stamps, Medicaid, and financial aid etc... Nevertheless, there are still a lot of other families who do not receive any type of help from the government. Only 57% of the near poor receive public aid, excluding school lunches, compared with 70.3% of those in poverty. These groups of people are often times overlooked by policymakers and advocates. It is sad to say, that in our own country such struggles exist and they are not even being acknowledged.

 http://finance.yahoo.com/news/30-million-americans-edge-poverty-133700133.html;_ylt=Asr6Zac2xcyEF5Vu8GlHHmrQtDMD