Less is more.
That's sometimes true. But sometimes, less is definitely less. The subject of income is one of those in which more always seems preferable to less. But the reality is that not everyone makes a living wage, and while that's a surprise to no one, the degree to which it affects the people of Miner County is higher than one might expect.

In any discussion on poverty, the term must first be defined. In 1995, the official poverty threshold was a family income of about $15,500 for a family of four with two children under the age of 18. Any families making less than that amount were officially designated as living in poverty.

But it's not quite as clear-cut as all that. Anyone who pays bills and tries to raise a family knows that even at that $15,500 per year level, making ends meet is almost impossible. That leaves us with a whole segment of the population who are just above federal poverty guidelines but do not make what could be considered a living wage.

When looking at the poverty statistics, we have to realize that those people are not included in the numbers, and not everyone living on an income higher than the poverty level is financially secure.

So, bearing that in mind, what do the statistics say for Miner County? The chart below shows general poverty statistics during the first half of the 1990s as well as the numbers for people under the age of 18.

The most striking piece of information becomes apparent right away. Over 20 percent of children in Miner County live below federal poverty guidelines. To be fair, it should be mentioned that in each of the surrounding counties, children are also more likely than adults to live in poverty.

The reason for that is not so complex. As the number of single parent households grows in relation to the number of households with two parents, more children are raised in families with only one income source. Decades ago, that might not have been unusual, but today, having both parents work has become a financial necessity for us.

As a result, children living with single parents are about six times more likely to live below the poverty threshold than children who live in families with two parents.

Even when we accept that sad, yet somehow understandable, explanation for the poverty level of our children, we cannot so easily explain the overall numbers on a larger scale. In comparison to the counties surrounding Miner, our poverty rate is the highest by a significant margin. While 16.1 percent of our population lived in poverty in 1995, the counties around us averaged about 11 percent.

In fact, if we exclude counties on Indian reservations or only have towns of under 1,000 (one of which Miner County has actually become since 1995), our poverty rates in 1995 were the eighth highest in the state.

That year, the median household income in Miner County was $23,705. That's nearly $6,000 below the median for South Dakota as a whole, and an astonishing $11,000 below the figure for the entire United States.

After the promising numbers showing relative financial prosperity presented in last week's column, it seems somehow contradictory that these numbers should bear out what they do. We'll need to go in-depth to discover why those conditions can exist simultaneously.

If there is such a thing as a solution to the problem of poverty in Miner County, it may look a lot like the yet-undiscovered solution to ending poverty everywhere. But it will also have to have facets unique to our place, economy, and lifestyles.

That's why looking at and understanding the numbers specific to us, even when they get complex, is so important. But in the end, income is more than a pile of numbers. It helps define how we live.

Miner Notes was a weekly column written by Matt Laible for MCCR to promote understanding about the place we call home. If you have questions or comments, please contact MCCR by calling 772-5153 or writing to P.O. Box 307 in Howard.