Poverty Is Rapidly Increasing In Suburbs Like Ferguson

Ferguson’s fires run counter to the narrative about suburbia, the story Americans tell themselves about strip malls and rolling lawns, about McMansions and upward mobility. Instead, the unrest in the St. Louis suburb following the shooting of an unarmed black teenager by a white police officer evokes images of 1960s-era Watts, of burning inner-city neighborhoods in New York, Washington, Detroit and Chicago.

The tear gas and protests in Ferguson were sparked by the shooting of Michael Brown, but they point to deeper, more pervasive problems that are plaguing suburbs across the country: rapidly increasing poverty, scarce jobs and even scarcer resources.

“Poverty is rising in suburban communities and it’s smashing the stereotype of calm and prosperity,” said Lawrence Levy, executive dean of the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University…Please click here to read Teresa Wiltz’s Stateline story that was published in the Huffington Post.