It’s hard for local kids to escape poverty.
The Realtors’ mantra of “location, location, location” does not just refer to the value of your house. It also relates to your kid’s chances of escaping poverty.
To be sure, poverty begets poverty. But it is not the sole determinant.
Much depends on where in the United States you grow up poor. Children of poor parents in some parts of the country exhibit strikingly greater upward-income mobility than do those in other parts of the country. According to a recent study conducted by leading Harvard University economists, children of parents in the bottom 25 percent of the income distribution have only about a 4 percent to 5 percent chance of rising to the top 25 percent of earners in Atlanta or Charlotte.
But in Salt Lake City and San Francisco, their chance of reaching the top quartile of earners is nearly three times greater.
Unfortunately, getting ahead in Florida, and especially in Orange County, is harder than it is in most of the rest of the country. By the time poor children raised in this county reach age 26, their annual paychecks are about $3,500 below the average of paychecks received by 26-year-olds from the lowestincome families in the rest of the United States.
The earnings shortfall may be the result of the dominance of low-wage industries in the local economy. But it also may result from a culturally deprived childhood, a substandard education, a more-than-normally segregated community and a distribution of income that is unequal enough to freeze initiative. Florida, in general, is one of the least egalitarian of states, ranking 47th out of 50, according to a standard measure of income equality (the Gini coefficient).
If the problem is indeed cultural deprivation, poor education and income inequality, then part of the solution is a state income tax that will help redistribute income and provide funds for more pre-school education, better qualified teachers and a richer, more demanding educational experience. It may also generate enough revenue to fund programs of male mentoring for the children of single mothers.
The failure to pass such measures sends the following message to Orange County households: If you are truly interested in your children’s economic future, move — preferably out of the state, but certainly out of the county.
Even moving to Osceola County or Polk County, where I live, can improve the earnings potential, the data suggest — though not by very much.
Children of poor parents in some parts of the country exhibit strikingly greater upward income mobility than do those in other parts.