North Carolina Untroubled By High Child Poverty

By GENE NICHOL

We get used to things we should never get used to. nnNorth Carolina countenances shockingly high levels of child poverty. About one in five of our kids are impoverished (19.5%). Child poverty is also potently racialized. Kids of color are three times as likely as white kids to be poor. And all children, regardless of ethnicity, are notably more likely to be poor than adults are.

We continue to compare unfavorably with other states. In 2019 (pre-Covid), North Carolina’s child poverty rate was 10th highest in the country. This is familiar terrain. We had the 11th highest state child poverty rate 52 years ago in 1969.  But a scan of the past half century shows modest successes as well as defining failures. We have seemingly decided, in the last dozen or so years, that it’s okay to let a huge percentage of our youngest, most vulnerable members endure wrenching hardship.

In 1969, almost one in four of our kids who lived with a parent was poor. Ten years later, the rate had been reduced by 5%. By 1989, it was cut further still to 16.9% and, impressively, came in below the national average. In 1999, 15.7% of Tar Heel kids were poor, again better than the rest of the country. But the 2008-12 Census Bureau survey, showing in part the impact of recession, revealed soaring state child poverty figures (23.5%), over 3 points higher than the national numbers. And the 2015-2019 census results were largely unchanged (20.8%), again well above national markers, but, this time, during a period of robust economic expansion.

Altered results, over time, show up geographically as well. In 1969, almost half of North Carolina counties had child poverty rates over 30%. Seventeen (mainly eastern) counties had rates over 40%. But by 1999, only five counties had rates of 30%, and none exceeded 40%, an impressive reduction. Again though, a decade later, 32 counties surpassed 30% and six came in over 40%. In the last decade, high rates have apparently calcified, reclaiming much of eastern North Carolina and including western counties like McDowell, Cleveland, Allegheny, Wilkes and Yadkin, where child poverty had earlier been in retreat.  All children in North Carolina, regardless of locale or ethnicity, experience higher rates of poverty now than two decades ago.

Has a returned, solidified, debilitating and extraordinary child poverty rate become an issue of primary focus for the General Assembly? Not in the slightest. Having one of the developed world’s highest child poverty rates is apparently, for us, un-worrisome. We explore no meaningful, majority-sponsored state anti-poverty initiatives. In fact, the last decade, instead, has produced brutal cuts to already meager social safety net protections. And, more broadly, we behave as if having deplorable child poverty levels is as natural as the morning sun. Who cares if we treat our kids worse than almost everyone else?

We, apparently, have bigger challenges on our minds. Like the bold threat of critical race theory submerging our public schools. Or the surpassing danger of transgender kids unfairly dominating our sports programs. Or the haunting specter of various folks showing up in our bathrooms. Or the daunting risk of publishing data about the ocean’s rise. Or the pesky peril posed by agricultural whistle-blowers. We’ve got real emergencies to deal with. We can’t be bothered with the likes of poor and hungry babies.

Thomas Paine wrote in “Common Sense” that “a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it the superficial appearance of being right.” As ever, here’s to brother Paine.

Gene Nichol is Boyd Tinsley Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of North Carolina School of Law and in 2015 started the North Carolina Poverty Research Fund after the UNC Board of Governors closed the state-funded Poverty Center for publishing articles critical of the governor and General Assembly.

From The Progressive Populist, September 15, 2021

Populist.com