Albany

Poverty in New York is more prevalent than we knew.

That's one of the findings of a new census report that offers an alternative to the traditional way of measuring poverty.

Unlike the old method, which critics say is too divorced from real-world factors, the new and so-called supplemental poverty rate analyzes the expenses and benefits that the poor actually experience.

Those factors vary by location. If you pay $1,200 in monthly rent, then you'll obviously be poorer than someone with the same income who pays $600. Yet poverty can be offset by benefits such as food stamps and subsidized housing.

Under the alternative measurement, 18.1 percent of New Yorkers are poor — up from 16.5 percent under the standard poverty rate.

That's not a huge statistical jump. But what's more dramatic is how New York now ranks relative to other states. In fact, the new way of measuring poverty should change what we view as the poorest parts of the country.

Mississippi and West Virginia?

The poverty rate in New York is higher.

Under the alternate measurement, New York's poverty rate jumps from 14th worst in the nation to seventh. And California, with a supplemental poverty rate of 23.5 percent, becomes the state where poverty is most common, followed by Nevada, Florida and Arizona.

On one hand, it shouldn't be surprising that New York fares worse when living expenses are considered. Housing costs are famously high downstate, and the property-tax burden is crushing from the tip of Long Island to Niagara Falls. (And yes, the poor do pay property taxes, if often indirectly.) Child-care costs are high in much of the state, too.

Yet New York also has a more generous safety net than many other states, and with an older population it has a relatively high percentage of people receiving Social Security payments, which are also included in the alternate measurement. But those benefits weren't enough to offset New York's higher costs.

If nothing else, the supplemental poverty report should help dispel the notion that the poor migrate to New York to take advantage of bigger food-stamp and welfare payments. Doing so doesn't make economic sense; in most cases, the poor are better off staying where it's cheaper to live.

"Most of the poor also don't have the money to migrate," said Nancy Denton, a demographer at the University at Albany.

A few other takeaways from the census report released last week:

More Information Poverty rates The states with the highest poverty rates, when cost-of-living expenses and safety-net benefits are part of the equation. The numbers are three-year averages from 2010 to 2012. STATE//PERCENT OF POPULATION IN POVERTY California: 23.8 Nevada: 19.8 Florida: 19.5 Arizona: 18.8 Louisiana: 18.5 Georgia: 18.2 New York: 18.1 Hawaii: 17.3 Arkansas: 16.5 Texas: 16.4 Source: U.S. Census Bureau See More Collapse

• Several of the states with higher poverty rates than New York were hit especially hard by the housing crisis and economic downturn. If Nevada, Florida and Arizona bounce back with the economy, New York's poverty rate could look even worse. (The supplemental poverty rate averages rates from 2010 to 2012.)

• The report doesn't get into this, but it's probably no coincidence that states with the highest poverty rates tend to have large immigrant populations.

• Anyone who thinks poverty is primarily a downstate problem has lost touch with reality. The census doesn't issue a supplemental poverty rate for specific locations, but using the traditional method, it reports that 26.8 percent of Albany residents — and 34.5 percent of the city's children — are below the poverty line.

• Nor is poverty an urban issue alone. In St. Lawrence County, to name just one rural example, 17.6 percent of residents and 25.4 percent of children live in poverty.

• The census bureau also issued supplemental poverty data last year, and New York's poverty rate, at 17.8 percent, was lower then. We're heading in the wrong direction.

• California and New York have significant concentrations of wealth, according to the census. (The states together contain 16 of the country's 100 wealthiest counties.) That each also has high poverty rates makes New York and California prime examples of the national trend toward income inequality as the middle class shrinks.

The policy implications of the census report would seem ripe for debate. Some will likely say it shows the need for a more generous safety net that keeps pace with higher living costs. Others might instead focus on the need to drive down taxes and other costs that make New York life so difficult for so many.

There should be consensus, however, that J-O-B-S are the best anecdote to poverty. I would hope there's agreement that New York's poverty rank is cause for concern.

The Empire State has a higher poverty rate than Mississippi? We're doing something wrong.

Have a story? Contact Churchill at 518-454-5700 or cchurchill@timesunion.com. The column appears Thursdays and Sundays.