One in 15 Americans Are Destitute

As the housing bust and fewer opportunities have pushed people out of metropolitan areas, new census data reveal that more Americans are worse off than previously anticipated—one in 15 Americans are now counted among the poorest of the poor. And concentrated poverty in poor suburbs is growing at twice the rate of cities. "There now really is no unaffected group, except maybe the very top income earners," said Robert Moffitt, an economics professor at Johns Hopkins University. The news comes a week before the government will release data that show more Hispanics, elderly, and working-age poor are worse off.