WCPC Director gives talk on inequality

Marcia Meyers speaks at session on income inequality

On January 11, Marcia Meyers, Professor of Social Work and Public Affairs and WCPC Director, spoke at a working session with the Washington State House of Representatives, Labor & Workforce Development Committee addressing the topic of income inequality in Washington State.
See the agenda of the session here.
See Dr. Meyers' PowerPoint presentation here.

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WCPC Social Policy Research (SPR) Fellowship

The West Coast Poverty Center (WCPC) is pleased to announce the 2012-2014 Social Policy Research (SPR) Fellowship program--an interdisciplinary initiative of the School of Social Work, the Evans School of Public Affairs, and the College of Arts and Sciences. A cohort of up to three University of Washington pre-dissertation doctoral students will receive up to two years of full support to pursue coursework, training and original research in topics related to US social policy and poverty alleviation. Funding for the SPR Fellowship Program is provided by the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation and the University of Washington.

Applications for the 2012-2014 cohort of SPR Fellows will be accepted from February 1-22.
The fellowship will begin in Fall 2012.

Find a description of the SPR Program here.
Find the application here.

Information sessions for students are scheduled for January 30, 5:00 p.m., in Raitt 114 and January 31, 12:30 p.m., in Social Work 116.
Please contact WCPC staff at wcpc@uw.edu for more information or with any questions.

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NOVEMBER 2011 POVERTY RESEARCH FLASH

Who is Banked in Low Income Families? The Effects of Gender and Bargaining Power

Within low income families, who has access to a bank account?
In addition to knowing whether a family has access to a bank account, it may be interesting to know whether individual members of a household have direct access to a bank account because use of mainstream financial services can help build a credit history and accumulate savings, which may be particularly important after a divorce or in the event of a partner’s death. Understanding these patterns may be particularly important for low income families, who are less likely to be banked, have fewer accounts when they are banked, and who are the targets of policy interventions to increase their use of mainstream financial products. Using data on low income, different-sex couples from the U.S. Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), WCPC Affiliate Marieka Klawitter and colleague Diana Fletschner ask whether women with greater bargaining power are more likely to be named on a bank account as well as whether women’s bargaining power is related to their partner’s likelihood of holding a solely owned account.
Learn what they found here.

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NEW, MORE NUANCED POVERTY MEASURE COUNTS 16% OF AMERICANS AS POOR IN 2010

After years of debate over how to improve the federal poverty measure, the Census Bureau recently released an alternative measure of poverty. The new measure, called the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), shows a slightly higher share of Americans living in poverty in 2010 compared with the traditional poverty measure (16 percent versus 15 percent). Unlike the traditional measure, the SPM takes into account households’ receipt of non-cash benefits such as food stamps and energy assistance as well as costs such as child support payments; variation in the cost of living in different areas; non-discretionary costs such as work expenses, child care, and medical expenses; and variation in housing costs depending on whether a family rents or owns its home. In addition, the threshold against which poverty is measured under the SPM will be adjusted to take into account changes in American households’ spending patterns and standard of living.

Changes in sub-group poverty rates under the SPM reflect these differences from the traditional measure. For example, poverty among the elderly is higher and poverty among children is lower in 2010 under the SPM than under the traditional measure. This reflects the addition of in-kind benefits and government assistance targeted at families with children as well as the subtraction of medical expenses from household resources. As another example, poverty rates among residents of non-metropolitan areas are lower and poverty in metropolitan areas is higher under the SPM because of cost-of-living adjustments, which increase the poverty thresholds for families living in urban and suburban areas and reduce them for those living in rural areas.

One contribution of the new measure is that it can demonstrate the impact of government programs and non-discretionary spending on households’ financial situations. For example, if the value of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) was not included in the measure, the SPM poverty rate would have been 18 percent instead of 16 percent; if food stamps were not included, it would have been 17.1 percent. If out-of-pocket medical expenses had not been subtracted from a family’s income, the SPM poverty rate would have been 12.7 percent.

The new measure will be used primarily for research purposes and will not be used to distribute federal funds.

For more information about the measure or to read the full report, click here.

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NEW CENSUS DATA ON STATE LEVEL POVERTY

Poverty Increasing and Incomes Declining in the West Coast States

Data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey show that poverty rates increased between 2009 and 2010 in California, Oregon, and Washington. According to the new data, 15.8 percent of California’s population was poor in 2010 compared with 14.2 percent in 2009. In Oregon, the rate increased from 14.3 percent to 15.8 percent. In Washington State, the rate rose from 12.3 percent to 13.4 percent. Poverty rates were particularly high among children and working age adults, as well as among minority groups and female-headed households.

In addition to increasing rates of poverty, incomes declined among the general population. Real median household incomes dropped 4.1 percent in California, 5.5 percent in Oregon, and 3.1 percent in Washington between 2009 and 2010, compared with a 2.2 percent decline in the nation as a whole during that period.

Marcia K. Meyers, Professor of Social Work and Public Affairs and director of the West Coast Poverty Center at the University of Washington, notes that the fact that poverty rates are increasing more than a year after the recession ended highlights the gaps in the safety net for poor families and children. “Many safety net programs are now linked to employment and funded with state revenues, which are also on the decline,” said Meyers. “As long as unemployment remains high, we can expect to see more families falling into poverty.”

Click here to hear Dr. Meyers in a conversation about poverty in Washington State and King County.

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NEW CENSUS DATA ON NATIONAL LEVEL POVERTY

Nearly 1 in 6 Americans were poor in 2010

New Census data show that, although the most recent recession officially ended in June 2009, the poverty rate for the U.S. increased from 14.3 percent in 2009 to 15.1 percent in 2010. The poverty rate has increased 2.6 percentage points since 2007. While poverty rates are not at historic highs, the number of Americans who were poor in 2010, 46.2 million, is the highest recorded since the Census Bureau began measuring poverty in 1959. The poverty line varies by family size. In 2010, a family of two adults and two children would be considered poor if its annual income fell below $22,113. Of those who were counted as poor, 44 percent had incomes below 50 percent of the relevant poverty threshold.
Read the full Census Bureau report here.
Reach related articles quoting WCPC Affiliate and Associate Professor of Public Affairs, Marieka Klawitter: Bellhingham Herald; KPLU; KIRO.

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WCPC FUNDING

2011-2013 WCPC Social Policy Research Fellowship Recipients

The West Coast Poverty Center (WCPC) is pleased to announce the 2011-13 recipients of the new Social Policy Research (SPR) Fellowship. Congratulations to:
(1) Jason Williams, Public Affairs
(2) Jorge Martinez, Sociology
(3) Chien-Hao Fu, Economics
The SPR fellowship is an interdisciplinary initiative of the School of Social Work, the Evans School of Public Affairs, and the College of Arts and Sciences. A cohort of University of Washington pre-dissertation doctoral students will receive up to two years of full support to pursue coursework, training and original research in topics related to US social policy and poverty alleviation. Funding for the SPR Fellowship Program is provided by the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation and the University of Washington.
A description of the SPR Program can be found here.
The closed 2011-13 call for applications can be found here.
A call for applications for the 2012-2014 will be announced and posted on our website in the later part of Fall quarter 2011.

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WCPC NEWS FLASH

WCPC Book Released by Russell Sage Press: "Old Assumptions, New Realities: Ensuring Economic Security for Working Families in the 21st Century"

The way Americans live and work has changed significantly since the creation of the Social Security Administration in 1935, but U.S. social welfare policy has failed to keep up with these changes. Old Assumptions, New Realities identifies the tensions between twentieth-century social policy and twenty-first-century realities for working Americans and offers promising new reforms for ensuring social and economic security. The volume includes chapters by Scott Allard; Jacob Hacker; Jody Heyman and Alison Earle; Paul Osterman; Robert D. Plotnick, Marcia K. Meyers, and Jennifer Romich; Jodi Sandfort; Michael Sherraden; and Michael Stoll. Read the book summary in our news flash here.