tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3672542189969261082.post7029615405911226959..comments2024-03-20T10:19:13.871+01:00Comments on Feckblog: Poverty in the USA / Census 2011Fecklesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07910553977192356538noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3672542189969261082.post-10096262501901891362012-05-21T00:19:32.835+02:002012-05-21T00:19:32.835+02:00They do not ask the question as to who pays in the...They do not ask the question as to who pays in the census data. As it seems those are now in the alternative poverty, even though there is still no comparing between man and woman. Ah well. Hopefully with time I will get that data....even though, not a huge gap.<br /><br />Oh, always pleased to meet a fan. Heya there!Fecklesshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07910553977192356538noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3672542189969261082.post-41091717658412009302012-05-12T10:31:49.576+02:002012-05-12T10:31:49.576+02:00I must say I am a fan of your blog. A few thoughts...I must say I am a fan of your blog. A few thoughts:<br /><br />1) I think it's abundantly clear that single childless women are earning at parity or better. So it is no surprise that non-family poverty rates are very similar, and I won't be surprised if the result skews in favor of women in the future<br /><br /><br />2) The official US measure of poverty does include the effect of CS/Alimony on the payee, not on the payer. I cannot think of a good reason for this. The only things that come to mind are making the numbers look better, or assuming that the support payments are calibrated to not push a payee into poverty.<br /><br />3) The unrelated adults in poverty removes the largest chunk of poor adults i.e. people with children. Also the presence of children in the under 17 age group makes that column meaningless.<br /><br />One way to look at it is the household count under the official measure:<br /> Married households: 3.4M<br /> Male headed: 0.9M<br /> Female headed: 4.4M<br /><br />That's 7.8M (3.4M+4.4M) adult women, and 4.3M adult men in poverty. That's still a 2:1 ratio against the ability of women to keep above the poverty line and 4:1 if counting those without a potential male earner.<br /><br />Alternatively, if you take the 18-64 (0-17 has children, and above 64 a big chunk of the poor men are already dead) age range you get<br /> Male count: 11.4M<br /> Female count: 14.9M<br /><br />That’s 30% excess female poverty.<br /><br /><br />4) SPM includes 'Near-money benefits', basically state subsidies/welfare and alimony. While the former is a good measure of the efficacy of state welfare, I do not agree that it is useful in arriving at a poverty count. If your so poor the government has to give you a house, you should be counted as poor.<br /><br />Every with that metric, female headed households are 27% more likely to live in poverty (23% vs 29%). Likely the removal of benefits from the income side will hit women more.<br /><br />What I don’t understand is why female poverty rates do not improve when welfare is factored in. The change is just 1%, and it seems that a combination of:<br />a) Welfare cancels out a lot of the effects of child rearing<br />b) Impact of children is overestimated<br />c) Impact of medical/old age are underestimated <br />d) Benefits do not kick in early enough, and when they do, are not sufficient to lift one over the threshold.<br />e) The new SPM unit includes a lot of women who cohabit, letting them approach efficiencies of married couples for fixed costs.<br />Figure 1, http://www.census.gov/hhes/povmeas/methodology/supplemental/research/Short_ResearchSPM2010.pdf<br /><br />However the effect on men is huge. There’s a 23% increase in poverty every after benefits kick in.<br /><br />The effect on married couples is even larger, a 30% increase. Again this is likely the effect of alimony/CS payments for remarried couples.<br /><br />5) The poverty numbers do not include incarcerated men (or women). Given incarceration rates are highest in poor communities; this likely reduces the poor male count.Solonoreply@blogger.com