The Social Problems of Poverty and Crime March 9, 2009 Sheila Rogers SOC 402, Professor Henson

The Social Problems of Poverty and Crime Every year the U.S. Census Bureau issues a report that details poverty in the United States. It provides statistics on how many people are poor and breaks the report down among age, race, region and by family type. Families are considered poor if their annual salary or income falls below whatever the federal measure of poverty is which is also recalculated each year. The institute for research on poverty stated that the poverty threshold for a four person family with two children in 2007 was $21,027. The threshold for one individual under age 65 was $10,787 and for an individual 65 and over the threshold was $9,944. (www.irp.wisc.edu) Poverty is most notable among blacks and Hispanics. The poverty rates in these groups of individuals greatly exceed the average. The rates remained near 30 percent in the 1980s and mid-1990s. In 2000 the rate dropped to 22.1 percent for blacks and 21.2 percent for Hispanics. For children under 18,18 percent or 13.3 million children lived in poverty. The poverty rate for families was 9.8% in 2007 which was equivalent to 7.6 million families who were living in poverty. The level of poverty is also affected by where people live. In 2007 the South was the greatest at 14.2 percent and the Midwest, Northeast and West were pretty much the same at 11.1, 11.4 and 12.0 percent respectively. (www.irp.wisc.edu) John A. Powell, a professor of law and director of the Kirwan Institute put together a report titled “Dedensifying” Urban Neighborhoods. In the report he detailed how areas of high-concentrated poverty invite crime