High Poverty Levels Resistant to Economic Recovery – Families Still Reeling from the Great Recession

September 2012

KEY FINDINGS:

• North Carolina’s poverty rate was 17.9 percent in 2011, statistically unchanged from the rate in 2010. The poverty rate jumped more than 25 percent since 2007, the beginning of the Great Recession.
• Nearly 1.7 million North Carolinians were officially in poverty in 2011, and more than 737,000 lived in deep poverty.
• The poverty rate for children in North Carolina was 25.6 percent in 2011, compared to 9.7 percent for seniors.
• People of color experienced higher rates of poverty. In 2011, 28 percent of African‐Americans, 34.9 percent of Latinos, and 27 percent of American Indians in the state lived in poverty.
• Median household income fell to $43,916 in 2011, down 1.8 percent from $44,726 in 2010.

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