The Great Recession and its aftermath have taken a toll on the nation’s children, with poverty rates among young people having increased in each of the last four years and likely to continue to climb in the near term, a recent report shows.
The study by the Washington-based Brookings Institution notes that the nation’s child-poverty rate rose from 18 percent to 22 percent from 2007 to 2010. During that period, the number of poor children surged by 3 million, to 16 million.
The figures are based on U.S. Census Bureau poverty measures, or the portion of children in families with incomes below the official poverty threshold, which is roughly $17,000 for a family of three and $22,000 for a family of four.
