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Equity: Report Shows Ties Between Poverty, Race

Poverty rates for the biggest racial minority groups in Illinois are two to three times higher than those for whites.

  The information comes from a new report on poverty by the Social Impact Research Center at the Heartland Alliance. The report, called Racism’s Toll, focused on race and poverty.

Some of the other statistics in the analysis showed that black children in Illinois are four times more likely to be below the federal poverty line than white children. Employment rates are lower for blacks, and black Illinoisans have shorter life spans than whites.

The report also looks at public policies that may have contributed to the problem.

The report is available at http://www.ilpovertyreport.org.

Maureen Foertsch McKinney is news editor and equity and justice beat reporter for NPR Illinois, where she has been on the staff since 2014 after Illinois Issues magazine’s merger with the station. She joined the magazine’s staff in 1998 as projects editor and became managing editor in 2003. Prior to coming to the University of Illinois Springfield, she was an education reporter and copy editor at three local newspapers, including the suburban Chicago Daily Herald, She has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Eastern Illinois University and a master’s degree in English from UIS.
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