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The rising cost of childcare and housing are putting pressure on Oregon families with young children, a new study finds.

(Ross William Hamilton / The Oregonian / 2012)

The typical Oregon family saw its income rise about 6 percent faster than inflation, to $66,300, in 2015. Still, that remained $1,300 less than the inflation-adjusted typical family income in 2007, before the recession, even though the costs of rent and child care have surged 10 and 18 percent faster than inflation since then.

Those are among the findings of a new report by Children First for Oregon, looking at how the economy, race, education, health care and other factors are affecting the state's youngest residents.

Mostly the news is bleak, particularly for rural Oregon children and for children of color. Stagnant wages and rising rents and other costs mean their families are struggling to make ends meet, let alone to provide their children with the experience likely to propel them to a future in the middle class.

Nearly 42,000 more Oregon households struggled to pay rent in 2015 than in 2008, for example. Families having to spend more than 30 percent of their income on rent rose to more than 491,000, or 51 percent of all households that rent.

And families with young children are bearing the brunt, the report said.

In 2015, Oregon's senior citizens had the nation's second-lowest poverty rate for people 65 and older: 5 percent, according to Kaiser Family Foundation estimates based on the Census Bureau's March 2016 Current Population Survey.

But the poverty rate was more than four times that high for children 17 and younger: 20.3 percent, according to Children First's analysis of 2015 American Community Survey data. That was worse than the state's 18.1 percent child poverty rate in 2008, the group says.

People who live and work in metro Portland don't necessarily sense the magnitude of the problem on a daily basis, because child poverty is concentrated in rural areas, especially in southern, far eastern and coastal Oregon.

Washington, Clackamas and Multnomah counties, by contrast, have the lowest child poverty rates and highest family incomes, along with Benton County, home to Oregon State University. Most children live outside the three-county Portland metro area, which is home to 44 percent of the state's population younger than 18.

All nine of Oregon's southernmost counties, home to communities such as Coos Bay, Roseburg, Medford, Klamath Falls, Burns and Ontario, have child poverty rates ranging from 28 percent to 39 percent.

Not surprisingly, black, Latino, Pacific Islander and Native American families and children face much more challenging circumstances than white and Asian families, the study found. They're less likely to own their homes, less likely to have high levels of parent education and more likely to be poor.

Circumstances for Oregon's white children aren't rosy either, particularly for children whose families live outside the Portland metro area.

In and near Portland, just 12 percent of white children live in poverty; that rate is 21 percent across the rest of the state. Much of that can be traced to parent education levels. In metro Portland, 41 percent of white parents have four-year college degrees. In the rest of Oregon, 25 percent do.

The report provides detailed information about the status of children and families in each of Oregon's 36 counties. It suggests that Clackamas children face generally positive and improving circumstances, including improved prenatal care, lower teen pregnancy rates, lower unemployment and fewer juvenile justice referrals than in recent years.

Multnomah County conditions for children and families appear more stagnant, according to the report, which looks at the most recent available figures and compares them with the previous year.

Washington County also showed widespread improvements, including in unemployment, infant mortality and child food insecurity. But one important statistic, child poverty, moved the wrong direction, rising to 16 percent from 13.8 percent, the report said.

-- Betsy Hammond

betsyhammond@oregonian.com