Yesterday, the Census Bureau made it official: The US's poverty rate hit 15.1 percent in 2010, as the median household income dropped and more than half of working Americans reported a job-related hardship. Today, the Pew Research Center tries to make sense of the numbers with a series of articles that highlight — and in some cases explains — the impact of what is increasingly being called the Great Recession.Amid all the doom and gloom, the survey points to the positive: "More than six-in-ten survey respondents (62%) say they expect their personal financial situation to improve in the coming year—the most optimistic reading on this question since before the recession began. Likewise, about six-in-ten (61%) say they believe the damage the recession has inflicted on the U.S. economy will prove to be temporary rather than permanent."
The report looks at economic outcomes, attitudinal trends, and behavioral changes among the full population, including subgroups. The analysis comes from two sources: a Pew Research telephone survey of a national sample of 2,967 adults conducted from May 11 to May 31, 2010 and a Pew Research analysis of government economic and demographic trend data.
Here's one interesting info nugget from the survey: "Blacks and Hispanics are more upbeat than whites. The young are more optimistic than middle-aged and older Americans. And Democrats are more upbeat than Republicans, even though Democrats have lower incomes and less wealth and have suffered more recession-related job losses. One likely explanation for these seemingly counterintuitive patterns is that in an age of highly polarized politics, Democrats and Republicans differ not only in their values, attitudes and policy positions, but, increasingly, in their basic perceptions of reality."
