especially how they re different. california has the highest poverty rate at 23.8% while texas rate declined to 16%. what does that mean? what can we take from those stats? let s talk to somebody who s lived in both states. the vice president for the policy rather for policy at the texas public policy foundation. he is also a former california lawmakers and author of the texas model book. thank you for joining us today. thank you for having me. we re going to put up another graphic that shows folks the highest taxes in america at the state level. california is fourth. texas is 45th. the conventional wisdom would be if you re paying higher taxes, you would have lower poverty in that state but it s exactly the opposite. it is exactly the opposite. in fact, what we re seeing with this new poverty measure that looks into both the cost of living and the value of government services as well as taxes is we re seeing
making. one expert in childhood education says the central point that the majority of southern schoolchildren are at poverty level is widely inaccurate, though. it s wrong. if you use official poverty measure, it s nowhere close to half the kids in school are poor. they used a different measure than poverty measure. they used the number of kids eligible for free or reduced cost school meals. national poverty rate is closer to 22%. most agree it s way too high. the general point about economic well-being is definitely correct. we ve had lots of inequality in the united states. it s increased greatly, especially at the top of the distribution. we have not been very successful at reducing children s poverty over the last 40 years, really. the study makes no mention of one of the biggest contributors
homeless and 5.6 million children living in poverty. and this dramatic increases happen during the democratic administration. and that speaks to the point that tom made and i quote your line that you actually something you wrote about three years ago that we only seem to be capable of producing solutions to our major problems, and that s the fundamental issue. it s not about right or left, not about democrats or republicans, because whoever is in power right now can still not deal with the biggest crisis we re having, which is the squeezing of the middle class and the downward mobility. 100 million people today are worse off than their parents were at the same age. jeffrey sachs, 1 in 2 americans near poverty. the data are unbelievable. the census came out with what they call the supplemental poverty measure. so they added in the costs of going to work. they added in the costs of out of pocket medical expenses, they added in the costs of child care
than owners of any traditional mattress brand. to learn more, or find an authorized retailer near you visit tempur-pedic.com. tempur-pedic the most highly recommended bed in america. the census department has given us a lot to think about when we give thanks tomorrow. the new measure of poverty called the supplemental poverty measure says 1 in 3 americans live in or near poverty. among the criteria, the new methodology accounts for is payroll taxes paid, government benefits received, rising standards of living, and cost of living differences. i found this jarring to say the least. the idea that 1 in 3 americans lives near poverty. but i know there s been a lot of discussion and debate over what near poverty means. because in many cases, near poverty means you have a tv, you may have a cell phone, but
mythologically for not giving an accurate as possible picture of what actually poverty in the country looks like and it was sort of arbitrary come up with by civil serve, deep in the democracy. she actually went to my high school randomly enough. they have now come up with supplemental numbers this week. interesting from comparing the poverty numbers, regular calculation and supplemental numbers. first the poverty numbers under the old way of calculating. you have 50.2% poverty rate among african-americans it is 27.5%, really just a stunning number and among hispanics 26.7%. under the new supplemental poverty measure you actually have hispanics are 28.2%, have the highest poverty rate, higher than african-americans. this is the first time we ve seen that. we re also seeing, victoria, not coincidentally a pretty steady