By Mike Sunnucks | Phoenix Business Journal
California — with its wealth, Silicon Valley, Hollywood and liberal politics — has the highest poverty rate in the U.S. when cost-of-living is combined with income levels.
Arizona — which likes to contrast its costs, business and political climates to California — isn’t far behind and has the fifth highest poverty rate when living costs are include in poverty statistics.
That is according Supplemental Poverty Measures reported by the U.S. Census Bureau.
Arizona has a 17.5 percent poverty rate, according the SPM measure which adds in cost of living, housing and utility bills to income levels.
That is fifth highest in the U.S. behind only California (20.6 percent), Florida (19.0 percent), Louisiana and New York (both at 17.9 percent), according to the Census Bureau.
