Poverty Among Rural Elders: Trends, Context, and Directions for Policy

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Abstract
Despite the improvedfortunes of the elderly in general, rural elders continue to face substantial economic hardships. In 1990, 16.1% of nonmetropolitan elders were poor compared with 10.8% of their metropolitan counterparts. This article develops a conceptualframework to analyze the higher than average poverty rates experienced by this group. Understanding the causes of poverty among the rural elderly requires a different conceptual framework than that used to explain poverty among working aged persons. Poverty among rural elders represents the accumulated effects of life experiences in environments of relative economic deprivation and of life course transitions, such as widowhood, that have exposed them to elevated risks of poverty. The effect of community of residence on rural elders' economic well-being is more likely to be through the public sector than through the local economy, as would be the case for younger poor people. A multilevel approach that emphasizes the life course and public sector capacity in the present area of residence is required to understand rural older people's disadvantaged position in U.S. society.