The Great Recession Cemented Suburban Poverty

The latest research on U.S. poverty shows that the fever that has held for years now shows no signs of breaking. Poverty continues to spread from the cities to the suburbs, where it is increasingly concentrated. While a recent update on the data reveals a jarring rise in poor populations, it's a difference in degree, not in kind. For areas that were already suffering, the Great Recession made matters that much worse.

The Brookings Institution has released an update to its 2011 report on concentrated poverty, a study that led to a book and generated a lot of discussion about suburban poverty in America. Drawing on more recent American Census Survey data (from 2008 to 2012), the update demonstrates how the Great Recession exacerbated a crisis that has seen poverty entrench in the suburbs.