US Counties With the Highest Poverty Rate (model-based)
3,143 US counties ranked by poverty rate (model-based), from highest to lowest. First are Issaquena County, MS (49.6%), Martin County, KY (48.1%) and East Carroll Parish, LA (46.5%). The middle one of the 3,143 has 13.6%.
What this measures
The percentage of people in poverty, as an estimate from a statistical model, not a direct count. The Census Bureau combines survey answers with tax and food-assistance records, to get figures that small counties' survey answers cannot give on their own. Source: Census SAIPE.
For most measures, a national ranking mostly sorts places by income and by how urban they are. Each county’s own page compares it with the 50 counties most like it instead, which is often the fairer view.
The 100 highest counties
Every state, highest first
Each state’s own published figure, not an average of its counties.
| Rank | State | % |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Louisiana | 18.9% |
| 2 | Mississippi | 18.3% |
| 3 | New Mexico | 16.9% |
| 4 | West Virginia | 16.4% |
| 5 | Kentucky | 16.1% |
| 6 | Oklahoma | 15.8% |
| 7 | Alabama | 15.7% |
| 8 | Arkansas | 15.4% |
| 9 | District of Columbia | 15.2% |
| 10 | New York | 14.1% |
| 11 | South Carolina | 13.9% |
| 12 | Tennessee | 13.8% |
| 13 | Georgia | 13.7% |
| 14 | Texas | 13.7% |
| 15 | Michigan | 13.5% |
| 16 | Ohio | 13.2% |
| 17 | North Carolina | 12.8% |
| 18 | Arizona | 12.6% |
| 19 | Florida | 12.4% |
| 20 | Indiana | 12.2% |
| 21 | Nevada | 12.2% |
| 22 | Oregon | 12.1% |
| 23 | Missouri | 12% |
| 24 | California | 12% |
| 25 | Pennsylvania | 11.9% |
| 26 | Montana | 11.8% |
| 27 | Illinois | 11.6% |
| 28 | Rhode Island | 11.4% |
| 29 | South Dakota | 11.4% |
| 30 | Kansas | 11.2% |
| 31 | Iowa | 11.1% |
| 32 | Delaware | 10.8% |
| 33 | Wisconsin | 10.6% |
| 34 | Maine | 10.5% |
| 35 | Massachusetts | 10.5% |
| 36 | Alaska | 10.5% |
| 37 | Wyoming | 10.4% |
| 38 | Washington | 10.3% |
| 39 | Hawaii | 10.2% |
| 40 | Nebraska | 10.2% |
| 41 | Virginia | 10.2% |
| 42 | Connecticut | 10.2% |
| 43 | Idaho | 10.1% |
| 44 | North Dakota | 10% |
| 45 | Vermont | 9.9% |
| 46 | Maryland | 9.7% |
| 47 | New Jersey | 9.7% |
| 48 | Colorado | 9.4% |
| 49 | Minnesota | 9.2% |
| 50 | Utah | 9% |
| 51 | New Hampshire | 7.3% |
More on poverty rate (model-based)
- US Counties With the Lowest Poverty Rate (model-based)
- Poverty rate (model-based) by US county: map by year and what it goes with
A ranking describes places, not the people in them, and a high or low place does not by itself say why. All US rankings.