Two Americas : Alternative Futures for Child Poverty in the U.S. National and State Projections to the Year 2010 / John T. Cook and J. Larry Brown.

Data on child poverty from the past 30 years are used to project future trends. A national-level analysis of child poverty over the past 3 decades for all children under 18 years old shows that the number of U.S. children in poverty increased by approximately 1 million from 1980 to 1988; and approximately 2.2 million more U.S. children fell into poverty from 1988 to 1992. Nearly 4 million more children lived in poverty in 1991 than in 1970. Child poverty threatens the well-being of children and the nation, and it reflects economic and policy change. These trends are used as the basis for projections of 2 highly different child poverty scenarios for the next 20 years. State-level analyses of child poverty based on decennial census data for related children in families from 1959 to 1989 reveal that during the 1960s child poverty rates declined by at least 20 percent in virtually every state, with the decline in some being as much as 60 percent; and over the 1970s and the 1980s state-level child poverty rates increased over 25 percent in many states, and as much as 90 percent in others. Projections of state-level child poverty over the next 20 years are produced from these trends. By viewing the future of child poverty first at the national level, then at the state level, those states that are likely to face more difficulty in dealing with the myriad of costly problems related to child poverty are highlighted. However, dramatic reductions in child poverty are possible under certain combinations of policy and economic conditions. Ten figures, 5 tables, 2 appendixes with 2 data tables and technical information, and 16 references are included. (JB)

Policymakers. ericd

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