Ben Furnas and James Kvaal on the kind of dramatic increases in poverty that we’re facing absent a very robust recovery program:
More than 12 million Americans are at risk. The number of people living in poverty will rise by 12.4 million by 2010—including 3.8 million children—if the unemployment rate reaches 11 percent, according to our analysis based on a methodology developed by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. And more than 7 million people will fall into deep poverty, living below half of the poverty line.
Dramatic increases in poverty are consistent with past recessions. The number of people living in poverty grew by 9 million between 1979 to 1983, and it grew by 8 million between 1989 and 1993.
The weak job market will also raise the number of people without health insurance. A percentage-point increase in unemployment could raise the number of uninsured by 1.1 million. If unemployment rates rise according to Moody’s projections—increasing from 4.6 percent in 2007 to 11.1 percent in 2010—more than 7 million people will likely lose their health insurance.
With stimulus, things will still be bad but not as bad as they might otherwise become.
Previous in TP Yglesias
By clicking and submitting a comment I acknowledge the ThinkProgress Privacy Policy and agree to the ThinkProgress Terms of Use. I understand that my comments are also being governed by Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, or Hotmail’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policies as applicable, which can be found here.