A recent report on Schmudget, a blog about Budget and Policy in Washington State, summarizes newly released 2008 poverty data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

According to the report, 730,000 Washingtonians lived in poverty in 2008, a number that remained unchanged from the previous year.  There was significant variation in poverty rates across communities in Washington, “with certain minority groups and counties experiencing higher rates compared to the general population.”

African Americans, Hispanics, and Native Americans had poverty rates well above the state average, whereas Whites and Asians experienced below-average poverty.

Among Washington’s 19 largest counties, the more sparsely-populated counties had rates of poverty above the state average (including Franklin, Yakima, Grant, Whatcom, and Spokane counties).

The report suggests that the full impact of the recession is not reflected in the 2008 data; they expect to see a sharp increase in the number of Washingtonians in poverty in 2009.

See the full report at: http://schmudget.blogspot.com/2009/09/new-census-poverty-data-reveal-deep.html

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