Two recent studies have confirmed it: In California, poverty exists in the most unlikely places.
First, a Gallup-Healthways State of American Well-Being study lists five California regional areas as among the best places to be in the country. In the top 20 among the 189 places ranked, Santa Cruz-Watsonville is in third place nationally, San Luis Obispo — Paso Robles was seventh, Santa Barbara – Santa Maria was 12th, Santa Rosa was 17th and Salinas was 19th.
The rankings are based on criteria established by Gallup-Healthways and on 354,473 telephone interviews with U.S. adults across all 50 states and the District of Columbia, conducted from January 2, 2015 to December 30, 2016.
There is also the yardstick used by the PPIC to measure poverty in California — its “California Poverty Measure (CPM), a joint research effort by PPIC and the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality. The PPIC describes the CPM as a more comprehensive approach to gauging poverty in California because it accounts for the cost of living and a range of family needs and resources, including social safety net benefits. So the more sophisticated measurement devised by the PPIC and Stanford shows results that differ from official government figures.
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