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For accurate poverty rates, exclude college students

An adjusted statistic would better reflect the needs of our population

The federal poverty rate is a measure that helps legislators address poverty through targeted initiatives in areas with the greatest needs. Researchers in the University’s Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service’s Demographics Research Group recently found that college students living off-campus skew poverty rates as they often earn little to no income and are included in the poverty rate calculation. Since college students don’t have the same needs as non-college students, including them in poverty rate calculations may result in misplaced anti-poverty initiatives. While college students should not be excluded from local census data, a poverty rate calculation that excludes them should be reported alongside the overall poverty rate to create a better picture of where persistent poverty affects Americans.

Poverty rate skewness is more pronounced in smaller towns, according to the findings. For example, in Charlottesville, the overall poverty rate is 27.5 percent, while the non-postsecondary student rate is just 14.8 percent. In larger cities where removing students from the poverty rate calculation has a smaller impact, the two poverty measures are not as disparate. Richmond, which has a population nearly five times that of Charlottesville, has an overall poverty rate of 25.5 percent and a non-postsecondary student rate of 22.6 percent.

The census brief also emphasized that income does not reflect the resources to which different population segments have access. It states, “we recognize that college or graduate student ‘poverty’ means something different than poverty among the unemployed, families with children, or the persistently needy.” Charlottesville’s poverty rate is inflated by the presence of University students who often do not experience the same intergenerational poverty that non-college students do. This is not to say undergraduate or graduate students do not struggle, as many support their own educations — rather, their poverty is often temporary.

It’s also worth noting that the poverty rate does not take into account those living in dormitories, but does include college students who live off-campus. As a result, the poverty rate is also skewed by each college’s on- and off-campus housing rates. Here at the University, all first-year students are required to live on Grounds; after their first year, a significant number move to apartments and other off-Grounds options. Since the state uses the poverty rate to determine where to direct anti-poverty initiatives, it does not seem reasonable to make the poverty rate dependent on college housing policies.

Like most statistics, the overall poverty rate does not tell the whole story — it’s hard to imagine a statistic that could do so for an issue as complicated as poverty. But since we rely on statistics to guide policy decisions, we should try to make these statistics as reflective of the population’s needs as possible.

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