South By North Strategies, Ltd.

A recent brief from the N.C. Budget and Tax Center breaks down the latest poverty data for North Carolina. The analysis is based on 2010 figures from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.

The Census’ American Community Survey recorded a large jump in poverty in North Carolina, from 14.3 percent in 2007 to 17.5 percent in 2010. That puts nearly 1.6 million North Carolinians living in poverty, or making at or below $22,314 annually for a family of four. More than 728,000 million North Carolinians were living in deep poverty, meaning they earn just half of the annual income threshold identified above as the federal poverty line.
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Overall, the poverty rate in urban counties in the state was 19.1 percent, 3.7 percentage points higher than rural poverty. A more detailed look shows that many counties in more rural parts of the state had some of the highest poverty rates. Robeson County had nearly 1 in 3 residents living in poverty while Rutherford and Wilson Counties had more than 1 in 5 residents living in poverty — these statistics represent the highest county‐level poverty rates for which data is available. Urban counties, like Wake and Mecklenburg, had some of the largest increases in poverty rates over the Great Recession with 44.6 and 43 percent increases respectively.