Los Angeles Times: “You Don’t Want to Live Anymore:” California’s Seniors Living in Poverty Struggle without Retirement Savings (October 15, 2022)

Adults 65 and older are the only age group in the country that saw an uptick in the poverty rate last year, from 9.5% in 2020 to 10.7% in 2021, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Supplemental Poverty Measure, which factors in programs aimed at helping low-income families and individuals who are not included in the official poverty rate.

Denny Chan, managing director of Equity Advocacy for Justice in Aging, said generational poverty has a compounding effect and often falls along racial and gender lines in part because of fewer opportunities to participate in the workforce, because of discrimination or other factors.

“For those of us who have had the privilege and are afforded the opportunity to retire, your Social Security check is going to look different than other people’s because of the ways in which workplace discrimination impacted your earnings and how much you paid into the system,” Chan said.