Who are America’s Poor Children?

03/14/2008

Who are America’s Poor Children?

Focus on your strengths, not your weaknesses. Focus on your blessings, not your misfortunes.
Roy T. Bennet

A fact sheet produced by the National Center for Children in Poverty, "Who Are America's Poor Children? The Official Story" (www.nccp.org) reports that nearly 13 million American children live in families with incomes below the federal poverty level, which is $20,650 a year for a family of four. Here are some highlights from the fact sheet:

The number of children living in poverty increased by 11% between 2000 and 2006. There are 1.2 million more children living in poverty today than in 2000.
Not only are these numbers troubling, the official poverty measure tells only part of the story, and it is widely viewed as a flawed metric of economic hardship. Research consistently shows that, on average, families need an income of about twice the federal poverty level to make ends meet.
Across the states, child poverty rates range from 6% in New Hampshire to 29% in Mississippi.
Black, Latino, and American Indian children are disproportionately poor, yet white children comprise the largest group of poor children.
24% of children of immigrants are poor; 16% of children of native-born parents are poor.
20% of children under age 6 live in poor families; 16% of children age 6 or older live in poor families.

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