The Convergence of Poverty Rates among States across the U.S.

Since income growth rate and poverty level are related, there is a possibility that the poverty rate may converge in the long run steady state as well. If the poverty rate converges, then for this study the state that begins with the high poverty rate would have a higher poverty reduction rate. To examine the convergence of poverty rate among the US states, this study uses two times series methodologies. First, in order to prevent the power loss from ignoring the structural break when testing for a unit root in a single time series, this study employs the newly developed panel LM unit root tests with level and trend shifts. The results of unit root tests of the log of poverty rate without allowing for structural breaks show that twenty six states reject the null hypothesis of unit root test for the ADF test, twenty five states for the LM test, and thirty five states for the RALS-LM test. The result of unit root tests that allow one structural break shows that the null hypothesis of a unit root test is rejected for twenty two states with the LM test, and thirty three states with the RALS-LM test. This supports poverty rates are converging among US states.