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The One Minute Geographer: The Great Plains — The Poverty Line, Education and Immigration
There’s more to the Poverty Line we saw on the last post about the Magical Meridian. As we might expect, that north-south gradient on the meridian, and on the Great Plains in general, shows up in other things such as the proportion of the population over age 25 holding a bachelor’s degree, and in the number of foreign-born residents.
I won’t put all the top ten and bottom ten counties on this map; instead I’ll outline the trends and highlight a few exceptions.
We’re in a primarily rural area, so only two counties have the same or slightly more baccalaureate degree holders that the national average of 32.1% — Hughes (34.7%) and Stanley (32.1%), both are around the South Dakota capital of Pierre. No surprise here — they are also among the top three highest income and lowest poverty counties on the strip. The counties with the smallest percentages of baccalaureate degree holders are in the south. Some of these counties have remarkably low numbers, such as Zavala (10.9%), about a third of the national average.
The only exceptional county south of the line is Taylor TX, ranked 7th with 25.2% of its adults holding a baccalaureate. Taylor County is the metropolitan core of Abilene.
