This is the first of two articles about poverty in Robeson County. Next Sunday the article will address solutions to the poverty problem — editor.

LUMBERTON — Robeson County is a poverty paradox: Its poverty rate is the highest in North Carolina, but its unemployment is not.

The county’s poverty rate has historically been among the highest in the state, and a report released on Nov. 24 by the North Carolina Justice Center shows that at 30.8 percent, it has remained on top. However, unemployment as of October is ranked 34th worst among the state’s 100 counties; while that borders on the bottom third, it hovered around 6 percent for five years, and didn’t spike to 11.8 percent until the worst recession in 40 years hit. The national rate was 10 percent on Friday.

That means that people are working in Robeson County, but not making enough to push them over the poverty line — an income of $11,201 for a single person and $21,834 for a family of four.

Robeson County’s poverty paradox can be traced to the emergence of a service economy as agriculture and factory work disappeared, creating a low-paid workforce called the working poor. Working poor aren’t paid enough to cover essential expenses, so they rely on social welfare programs to supplement services they cannot afford.

“The poverty paradox is a phenomenon of the 1990s,” said Jim Johnson, a distinguished professor with the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “During the heyday of economic growth and massive job creation, opportunities and wages increased, but at the same time, the gap between the haves and have-nots widened after a quarter century of narrowing the gap.”

Nationally, the poverty rate has increased as the recession deepened; it was 12.5 percent in 2007, and is currently 13.2 percent — the first statistical increase since 2004, and the highest rate in 12 years, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

North Carolina’s Scotland and Vance counties follow Robeson with 28.9 percent and 25.5 percent poverty, respectively, but they buck the poverty paradox: Scotland’s unemployment rate is the worst in the state at 17.2 percent, and Vance’s is well into the bottom third at 13.6, according to the state Employment Security Commission.

Robeson County’s population was 129,123 in last year, which means 39,770 people live in poverty. The county is one of 250 in the United States and one of 10 in the state that have been plagued by persistent poverty, maintaining more than 20 percent poverty since the federal government began tracking it 50 years ago.

Long-standing economic structures have kept the southeast and northeast regions of the state in poverty, said Rev. Mac Legerton, executive director at the Center for Community Action.

“Poverty is very cyclical, so unless there are very focused interventions to help both individuals in poverty and systems ... move out of poverty, then the cycles of poverty will continue from generation to generation,” Legerton said.

The gap between the underemployed — full-time work that doesn’t cover necessary expenses — and middle class widened beginning in the 1990s, Johnson said.

“Working poor are inherent in the restructuring of the U.S. economy where people are employed in more part-time work. There was a shift from manufacturing-based economy to a service economy that (uses) part-time workers,” Johnson said.

Robeson County had a low of 5.7 percent unemployment in April 1990; the rate peaked at 12.9 percent in 1992, and closed the decade at 7.8 percent, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“Manufacturing increased in the ’60s through the ’80s and began to decline in the ’90s, largely due to federal trade policy,” Legerton said. “What we’ve had is an outsourcing of manufacturing and agricultural employment and an insourcing of service-related jobs. The two together have led to both rising unemployment and rising underemployment.”

A Center for Community Action study from 2004, when most factory jobs were gone, explored the ripple effects for the previous decade: 8,708 factory jobs were lost, as were an additional 9,637 jobs in sectors related to factories. The study estimated the county lost $221 million in tax revenue.

“Many jobs in manufacturing, particularly in the early years, provided low-wage employment, but as manufacturing increased and improved, both wages and benefits were raised,” Legerton said. “By the end of that period, those jobs were much more life-sustaining than the jobs we now have in the service economy ... .”

The median income in Robeson County in 1989 was $18,083, according to the American Community Survey, an ongoing, small-scale update of the decennial census. By 1995 it was $25,150, and in 2000 it hit $27,860. Now it is $30,932; the national median income is $52,029.

Lost jobs in agriculture also added to the working poor. The steady decline of tobacco profits has particularly hurt North Carolina, the top tobacco-producing state in the nation.

“Once industrial agriculture and commodity production replaced local food production, we began to export our crops and import food from outside our region and nation,” Legerton said. “Right now the food we eat travels on average more than 1,000 miles.”

With service emerging as Robeson County’s new industry, the workforce is largely temporary and part-time, hired on an as-needed basis.

“There are large numbers of people who are working part time who would prefer to be working full time,” Johnson said. “It’s those people in part-time jobs, that pay ... minimum wage, who are not making enough to live above a poverty existence.”

Working poor have little pay and no benefits, which means more people in Robeson County depend on social welfare. According to North Carolina’s annual report last year, about 3.4 million people statewide were served by Health and Human Services. Robeson County Department of Social Services did not provide the number of people served, but said this fiscal year’s budget was nearly $326 million, a jump from $206 million seven years ago.

“Socioeconomic status is what determines the level of health to begin with,” said Bill Smith, director of the Robeson County Health Department. “If you’re well-off as an African American, American Indian, or a white person, your health is very similar, and it’s the same thing with the poor.

“Theoretically, you have to get the economy up to improve overall health. Poor health and poor socioeconomic status are directly linked.”

According to the North Carolina Justice Center, 22.8 percent of people in Robeson County don’t have health insurance, which means they depend on hospital emergency rooms and the Health Department for primary care.

Medicaid is an insurance alternative for low-income elderly, disabled, children and families; 47.2 million people are enrolled nationwide.

At the end of November, Robeson County’s Medicaid program included 41,146 people. Sally Speights, Medicaid program manager, said the program has already spent $95 million since the fiscal year started in July. This year’s budget is about $283 million, up from $181 million in 2002.

“(The budget) was higher last year and it’ll probably be higher next year,” Speights said. “We’re seeing a lot more people than we’ve never seen before apply for benefits because of the economy and jobs.”

In December 1999, 31,803 Robesonians depended on Medicaid, and last year 39,412 did.

The Health Department, which sees up to 12,000 people annually, offers services on a sliding-fee scale based on poverty; income level determines how much they pay, so at least 30 percent of the population is served for free.

“The issue for a lot of them is if you refer out, they can’t afford to see a specialist. If they have severe dental issues, they can’t take care of that,” Smith said. “They may get the basics and may even get preventative care, but after that they have to do without.”

Food stamps are another indicator of poverty. As of the end of October, 34,896 Robesonians were part of the program, up from 25,863 in 2004.

“Food stamps numbers have continued to grow, and they’ve gotten worse with the recession. If the economy gets better, that will help,” said Allyson Martin, food stamps program manager. The local program budget is $39 million this fiscal year, a nearly $10 million increase from last year.

Each month, an average of 28.4 million people nationwide use food stamps, costing $34.6 billion last year. Participation is expected to be significantly higher this year as record-high unemployment and poverty affects more people.

“For people who are able to work and who want to work, this is not a way of life for them, this is a temporary fix,” Martin said. “I don’t think anybody wants to be on the program. But that’s what we’re here for when they need it to be able to supplement their food.”

Most participants are elderly or children, and last year 40 percent of food stamps recipients lived in households with earnings — the working poor.

While poverty is a historic problem in Robeson County, Johnson says there is a way out: Local government must adapt to the service economy and find ways to attract sustainable jobs — long term, full-time employment that pays enough for workers not only to afford essential items, but also to have disposable income.

“The causes and solutions to poverty are very complex. Some people hold individuals responsible for their own poverty and some people hold systems responsible for poverty,” Legerton said. “In reality, both the causes and solutions of poverty are found on both the individual and systemic sides of our lives.

“Therefore, our solutions need to build both individual responsibility and capacity, as well as systemic support and opportunities.”