Poverty Hitting One in Six Californians

The economic recovery in California has not reached a sizable percentage of the population, with more than 16% of Californians living in poverty, according to an analysis released Tuesday by the California Budget and Policy Center.

In most California counties, the poverty rate increased from 2007 to 2014. Of the 40 California counties with available data, 32 had higher poverty rates last year than they did in 2007 before the state's recession began, the study said.

The California Budget and Policy Center is a not-for-profit that conducts independent, nonpartisan budget analysis.

"Millions of Californians continue to struggle to meet their basic needs, even after several years of steady job gains," the study said. "Poverty remained widespread even though the state's unemployment rate declined from a high of 12.2% in 2010 to 7.5% in 2014."

The federal poverty line is about $19,000 for a family of three. The overall rate fell slightly between 2012 and 2014 -- by 0.6% -- but the 2014 level of 16.4% is a full 4 percentage points higher than it was in 2007.

The study highlighted the differences between counties:

• Not only was the poverty rate higher in 32 of the 40 counties with available data from 2007 to 2014, but there was no statistically significant difference in poverty rates in the other 8 counties;
• In Lake County, the poverty rate rose to 25.9% of the population. In Kings County, 26.6% live in poverty;
• In Lake, Kings and San Bernardino counties, the poverty rate jumped by more than 8 percentage points from 2007 to 2014; and
• In 15 other counties, poverty rates in 2014 were 4 to 8 percentage points higher than in 2007. Most of those counties are in the Central Valley and in the Sacramento region.

"Many factors could contribute to the uneven recovery across California's counties," fact sheet author Alissa Anderson wrote. "These include differences in the availability of well-paying jobs and/or of sufficient work hours, as well as changes in county demographics, such as whether large numbers of people who struggle to get by move into a county."

By David Gorn
Via http://www.californiahealthline.org/capitol-desk/2015/12/poverty-hitting-one-in-six-californians

Economist: Job growth in Inland Empire returning to normal

Businesses are hiring, and the Inland Empire is starting to see it — in the numbers anyway.

The region saw the net creation of about 46,800 new jobs in 2013 — a statistic Inland Empire economist John Husing said is a return to normalcy after the economic downturn of the past few years.

“What normally has occurred in the Inland Empire is, if you go back over the last 10 years and you look at growth, 46,000 is a slightly above-average number for us,” Husing said. “We’ve been as high as 60,000 but 46,000 is really strong. So it means that 2013 was an extraordinarily strong year, and it means that the whole economy has reached the point where it shifted gears from being struggling to starting to act more normally.”

The figure, Husing said, is based on a revision by the California Economic Development Department released on Friday. An earlier EDD estimate had net job growth in the Inland Empire for the past year at about 14,000 jobs, though the figure was presented prior to new calculations from data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Husing said.

“The conversations I’m having with people in different sectors of the Inland Empire economy are very positive,” said Paul Granillo, president and CEO of the Inland Empire Economic Partnership. “People have been reticent to invest and to hire and I think what I’m hearing is that now is the time that things have changed and that investment is necessary for them to position themselves for the next few years.”

According to Husing’s data analysis, social assistance was a sector that made the biggest gain in job growth with about 12,000 new jobs.

“That was a rather aggressive expansion of social services last year and that makes sense given the fact that unemployment tends to be rather high,” Husing said.

The revised data also marked a strong return for the construction sector with 6,700 new jobs according to a chart provided by Husing.

“Construction has been negative for the last several years,” Husing said. “That is a definite turnaround for that sector since we’re finally seeing construction taking back its traditional role as a strength for our economy.”

In an economic report keynote earlier this year, Husing said the sectors of logistics and healthcare are major driving forces of the regional economy.

According to the latest march EDD report, looking at the past year, trade, transportation, and utilities were major growth sectors, adding 9,600 more jobs. Transportation and warehousing added 4,300 jobs, retail trade was up 3,800 jobs and wholesale trade increased by 1,700 jobs over the year, according to the EDD.

Other industries that reported job gains for the year include leisure and hospitality employment with 8,600; education and health services with 6,600 jobs; and professional and business services with 6,100 jobs, according to the EDD report.

The Southern California Association of Governments, Granillo said, expect the Inland Empire population to grow from 4.3 million to 6 million by 2035.

“The economy is on an upswing and people are making investments in the employees, and looking to, in some cases, relocate to the Inland Empire, based on the fact that our economy is situated for growth,” Granillo said. “The people I’ve been talking to lately are in the professional services sector – lawyers and accountants looking to grow their footprint in the Inland Empire or to establish companies in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties.”

PHOTO: The State Economic Development Department on Friday released a jobs report for the Inland Empire - showing a surprising 46000 people were hired for new jobs - the figure is higher than an earlier report - surprising IE economist John Husing. Construction has made a strong showing in the new report.

via: http://www.sbsun.com/business/20140312/economist-job-growth-in-inland-empire-returning-to-normal

More than 1 in 5 California children live in poverty, study finds

As California diversifies, it will face serious economic struggles if it fails to pay attention to widespread childhood poverty, according to a report released Monday by the Center for the Next Generation. The center found that more than 1 in 5 children in the state are living in poverty.

The study, "Prosperity Threatened: Perspectives on Childhood Poverty in California," focuses on new U.S. Census Bureau figures, finding that childhood poverty is endemic among the state’s fastest-growing population -- Latinos -- with nearly 1 in 3 Latino children living at or below the poverty line.

Researchers contrasted the numbers with data on seniors, which showed fewer than 1 in 10 living in poverty.

“We can’t honestly separate our state’s economic future from current poverty rates among our kids,” said Ann O’Leary, vice president and director of the center, who co-wrote the report. “Our ability to thrive as the world’s ninth-largest economy depends on having an educated, healthy and stable next generation of workers.

"We’re headed in the opposite direction,” she added.

The study, which was funded by the center, details a trend of increased childhood poverty in California that accelerated during the recession. And while childhood poverty fell in five California counties between 2006 and 2011, 16 counties saw a reduction in senior poverty during the same period.

Los Angeles County, with more than 9.6 million people, is home to nearly 2.4 million children -- more than 17% of whom live in poverty, according to the study.

Of 51 counties studied, L.A. County ranked 22nd in terms of poverty rate.

In Orange County, slightly more than 16% of the children live at or below the poverty line, according to the study.

“We’ve taken steps to provide our seniors with some level of assurance that they’ll be cared for in their later years,” said O’Leary, adding that the study, funded by the center's general budget, began last fall. “California’s grandparents should ask why their grandkids don’t get the same treatment.” 

The report noted a correlation between education levels and childhood poverty rates; counties with the highest number of parents with college degrees also have the lowest levels of childhood poverty. The opposite also is true, the study found.

O'Leary and her coauthors suggest that state leaders make tackling childhood poverty a central goal of any economic recovery plan.

The center's mission is to influence the national debate over sustainable energy and improving opportunities for children and families.

via LA Times