The federal poverty line for a family of four was $23,283 last year, nearly one-quarter of what it takes to live in New York City and slightly more than one-third of what it takes to live in St. Louis, according a family budget calculator from the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. In fact, EPI found that in 615 cities across the country it takes a total income at least twice the federal poverty line for any type of family with three children or fewer to afford basic expenses. “I don’t think anyone gets any sense of economic security from living at that line,” Elise Gould, one of the paper’s authors and the director of health policy research at EPI, told The Huffington Post. “It’s a measure of absolute deprivation.” To put that into perspective, it takes a combined income of $44,617 for a two parent, one child household to cover basic needs in Simpson County, Mississippi, the region with the lowest cost of living for that type of family, according to EPI’s calculator.
Posted on: Thu, 04 Jul 2013 05:39:17 +0000
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