Methodology

To identify the metropolitan areas hit hardest by extreme poverty, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed five-year data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2018 American Community Survey on poverty rates at the Census tract level. The metro area where the largest percentage of poor residents live in extreme poverty neighborhoods — Census tracts where a poverty rate is 40% or higher — has the highest extreme or concentrated poverty rate.

In our analysis, we only considered Census tracts with at least 500 people and college or graduate school enrollment below 50%. Metro areas were also excluded if over 25% of the population in tracts or neighborhoods of concentrated poverty were college or university students.

All other data referenced in the story, including educational attainment, homeownership, SNAP benefit recipiency, average household income, racial composition, and unemployment are also from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2018 American Community Survey, and were aggregated from the Census tract to the metropolitan level.