Texas Women in Poverty: Part I

This posting explores female poverty in Texas. It is the first part of a two-part look at how poverty affects women in our state, what it looks like in terms of education, age, employment, and race/ethnicity, what the ripple effects of it might be on children, and how policies to mitigate structural gender inequities might benefit Texas economically and socially. Overview Nationally, females make up a greater share of the population in poverty than their share of the population as a whole, while males are underrepresented among those in poverty. Figure 1: Percentage of Females 18-64 Living in Poverty, U.S., 2016 On average, 13 percent of females living in the US are living in poverty. The state with the highest proportion of females in poverty is Mississippi (23 percent). Maryland and New Hampshire tie for the lowest proportion of females in poverty (7 percent). Texas has a slightly higher female poverty rate than the nation (14 percent). Interestingly, New Hampshire ha