Rural Poverty: Myths and Realities
 by Julie N. Zimmerman

As debates on welfare reform have made clear, new approaches to low income households have become an integral part of public discourse. With the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Act (HR 3734), poverty programs are moved from a federal safety net to state-directed efforts focused on actively moving individuals "from welfare to work."

However, implementing these programs holds particular implications for rural areas where poverty rates are higher, those living below the poverty line are more likely to be already employed, and local governments possess fewer resources.

In his piece from the Population Reference Bureau, William P. O'Hare discusses several myths about poverty which tend to be part of public debates around poverty and reforming poverty programs (1996). And while these myths do not hold for the nation as a whole, given the distinctiveness of poverty in rural areas, they are even farther removed from reality in rural areas.

Following are five myths about rural poverty. In the next issue of Rural Development News, six more myths about rural poverty will be discussed.

Myth: The majority of the poor live in inner-city neighborhoods.* While poverty rates are highest in inner cities, only 23 percent of those in poverty live there. Overall, poverty rates in rural areas have been and continue to be consistently higher than those found in urban areas, which includes inner cities. In this case, rural areas have the second highest poverty rates of 16.3 percent when compared to urban areas (RSS Task Force 1993:32). In 1990, there were 9 million people in rural areas living in poverty; nearly one in five rural residents. In 1993, in the North Central region, the rural poverty rate stood at 13.6 percent, whereas the poverty rate for urban areas was only 11.4 percent.

Myth: Poverty in rural areas looks much like that found in urban areas. While poverty exists in both urban and rural areas, the characteristics of those living in poverty in these two places are distinctly different. Not only do rural areas have consistently higher rates of poverty than urban places, but those living in poverty in rural areas are more likely to be white and living in two-adult households. Rural areas also have higher rates of persistent poverty and they are dispersed over a larger geographic area. Still, compared to their urban counterparts, those living in poverty in rural areas are more likely to be working.

Myth: The poor live off government welfare. Given the public debates over welfare reform, one would assume that this was indeed the case. However, the majority of those living in poverty do not receive government welfare assistance. Such assistance accounts for only one-quarter of the income of adults living in poverty (O'Hare 1996). For rural areas, participation rates in social service programs are even lower.

Myth: Homelessness is an urban problem. Homelessness in rural areas is often overlooked because it is thought of as an urban issue. An accurate count of the homeless is difficult if not impossible. Estimates of the rural homeless vary from 6.9 percent (Census 1992) to 18 percent (NRHA 1996:3) of the total homeless population.

As shelters are a rarity in rural areas, those without a fixed place of residence find shelter in places such as doubling-up with other families, living in abandoned homes, or living in their vehicles at camping facilities. Research suggests that the characteristics of the homeless in rural areas differ from those in urban areas. For example, they are more likely to be white, more likely to be working, and more likely to be two-parent families (Wright and Wright, forthcoming).

Myth: Poor families are trapped in a cycle of poverty that few escape.* The population of individuals and households living in poverty is actually a dynamic group. For many, `spells' of poverty are temporary, lasting less than a few years (O'Hare 1996). On the other hand, rural areas have higher rates of persistent poverty than urban areas. Persistent poverty refers to places with poverty rates of 20 percent or more in each census 1960-1990. Persistent poverty tends to be found in particular regions such as Appalachia and the South. In the North Central region, areas of persistent poverty are located primarily in North Dakota, South Dakota and Missouri.

Conclusion

As O'Hare puts it "The recent public debate over welfare reform was often influenced by myths, anecdotes, and misunderstandings rather than by the facts about U.S. poverty" (1996b). The same holds true for poverty in rural areas. And while poverty in urban and rural areas does not look the same, neither does poverty in the North Central region necessarily call forth the same issues as that in other areas. In his foreword to the Rural Sociological Society's Task Force on Persistent Rural Poverty, Emery Castle summed it up this way;

Rural poverty is not one problem--it is many. Many Native Americans living in rural areas are poor, but their problems are very different from the poor in rural Appalachia. And the black people living in the Mississippi Delta have different issues to confront than do those in either of the other rural places. This is one facet of the fundamental, defining characteristic of rural America--its enormous diversity (Castle, 1993:x-xi).

As we work to make sense of and implement the recently signed Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Act (HR 3734), we cannot forget that poverty has many faces and that people living in poverty face a wide range of barriers. Under this new legislation, while there are more opportunities for states to experiment and potentially build locally-relevant programs, there are also more opportunities for missteps.

Given the strength of myths surrounding the reality of poverty, for those living in poverty in rural areas the recent welfare reform could potentially leave them further behind.

Myths indicated with an asterisk are from O'Hare (1996). Thank you to Mark Nord of the USDA's Economic Research Service for providing the data for the North Central region. For more information or for a list of the works referenced in this article, contact Julie N. Zimmerman at the NCRCRD, (515) 294-2979. References

Census. 1992. The 1990 Dicennial Census of the United States. U.S. Bureau of the Census: Washington, D.C. NRHA. 1996. The Rural Homeless: America's Lost Population. National Rural Health Association: Kansas City, MO. O'Hare, William P. 1996. A New Look at Poverty in America. Population Bulletin Vol. 51, No. 2. Rural Sociological Society Task Force on Persistent Rural Poverty. 1993. Persistent Poverty in Rural America. Westview Press: Boulder, CO. Wright, Dean, and Susan Wright. Forthcoming. "Homelessness" in Gary Goreham (ed.) Encyclopedia of Rural America. Garland: New York, NY.

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