“If we do not solve this problem, we are not going to want to live in Southern California. The communities are going to become unhinged.”
Redlands-based economist John Husing issued a dire warning Wednesday, as elected officials from across Southern California pledged to reignite Lyndon Johnson’s war on poverty:
“If we do not solve this problem, we are not going to want to live in Southern California. The communities are going to become unhinged.”
Husing is one of several economists who looked at findings from the 2012 American Community Survey and state Employment Development Department to find out where poverty is concentrated in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, Ventura, San Bernardino and Imperial counties.
Some of the results were alarming, said economist Wallace Walrod, who advises the Orange County Business Council.
They found disparities among the percentage of residents in poverty across counties: 19.1 percent in Los Angeles, 12.9 in Orange and 20.4 in Riverside. But Husing and others said the flow of goods and services is so closely integrated that poverty is a regional, not local, issue.
[…]
