40% of people displaced by Katrina living below poverty line, 1/3 unemployed

[babylonsister]

Katrina evacuees feel money pinch
By Brad Heath, USA TODAY

Almost 40% of the people displaced from New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina were below the poverty line last year, according to a government survey.

That survey, by the U.S. Census Bureau, shows that thousands of people who fled the hurricane two years ago landed in dismal economic straits, often facing meager paychecks or unemployment after the storm scattered them across the USA. It found nearly a third of those who fled the hurricane could not find jobs last year, and thousands more weren't trying.

"People got here, but what hasn't happened is that next step to economic stability," says Don Baylor, a senior policy analyst at the Center for Public Policy Priorities in Austin. "Many of them are not economically stable."

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http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-10-08-katrina-evacuees_N.htm?csp=34