CORVALLIS, Ore. – Despite high levels of poverty and unemployment rates that are nearly double that of their urban counterparts, working families in rural Oregon tend to make less use of public assistance, especially childcare subsidies, according to researchers with Oregon State University’s Family Policy Program.
OSU researchers Deana Grobe and Bobbie Weber, along with Elizabeth Davis of the
The lone exception seemed to be in food stamp usage: only 5 percent of rural families that received a child care subsidy did not use any food stamps during the three-year period, compared to 8 percent of city dwellers.
“Given limitations of our data, we don’t really know why the rural families used food stamps more than childcare or other forms of support,” Weber said. “What we do know is that from a policy perspective, there seem to be equity issues in the state’s child care assistance program that is supposed to be equally accessible across the state.”
The study, published in the current journal issue of Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, looks at 48 months of data from five
Counties in
Specifically, the researchers looked at 27,628 single-parent families, led mostly by women, who had at least one child in the childcare subsidy program. The study points out that regardless of location, subsidy users had similar characteristics regardless of a rural/urban divide: most were single-parent families, mostly white, with fairly low levels of education, and unstable employment.
Grobe said that one of the reasons for a difference between childcare subsidy and food stamp usage could be eligibility requirements. Childcare subsidy eligibility is tied to employment – women have to work at least 20 hours a week to be eligible, whereas food stamps do not have a work requirement. Many low-wage workers have unstable job situations in service-oriented industries such as fast food or retail. Hours they work fluctuate, and there are stretches of time they may not be able to find work, so eligibility would be difficult to maintain.
“In 2007, the Oregon Legislature fixed many of these issues, and in 2009 the state aligned the childcare subsidy more to food stamp requirements,” Grobe said.
Another factor in lower usage of government subsidies could be attributed to better social networks. Weber said previous research points to a greater level of family and overall social networks in rural areas, as well as a stigma in some rural communities on use of government programs.
Researchers also found that families in rural
However, Weber said the continued high levels of unemployment and poverty rates in
“Studies of social networks in rural communities, attitudinal surveys, and more research on whether people are finding barriers to getting or retaining assistance in rural areas, are greatly needed,” Weber said. “We may be inadvertently disenfranchising people in certain counties and areas. There needs to be recognition of the diversity of our state, and that means going beyond a one size fits all approach.”
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About the OSU College of Health and Human Sciences: Emphasizing a holistic approach to optimal health and disease prevention, researchers focus on nutrition, physical activity, the psychology of aging improving the health of children and older adults, public policy, access to health care, and maximizing environmentally friendly materials and structures.
By: Angela Yeager, 541-737-0784; angela.yeager@oregonstate.edu
Sources: Deana Grobe, 541-737-5373 or deana.grobe@oregonstate.edu; Bobbie Weber, 541-737-9243 or bobbie.weber@oregonstate.edu