By Sean Whalen
Nevada News Bureau
Nevada News Bureau Staff
The percentage of people living in poverty in Nevada increased to 12.4 percent in 2009 from 11.6 percent in 2008, the U.S. Census Bureau reported this week.
A total of 321,940 Nevadans were estimated to be living below the poverty level in 2009, an increase of more than 25,000 from the prior year, according to the census data.
The national poverty rate was estimated at 14.3 percent in 2009, up a full percentage point from 2008. Nearly 43 million people nationwide are living in poverty.
Nevada’s poverty rate is lower than many other states, according to the data. Nineteen states had lower poverty rates than Nevada.
Only five states had estimated poverty rates lower than 10 percent – Alaska, Connecticut, Maryland, New Hampshire and New Jersey. On the other side of the distribution, five states had estimated poverty rates at or above 17 percent in 2009 – Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi and West Virginia.
Poverty rates ranged from a low of 8.5 percent in New Hampshire to a high of 21.9 percent in Mississippi.
