Wyoming kids are better off economically than the average American child, according the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s latest Kids Count report, which tracks child well-being. The study found that only 14-percent of Wyoming children live in poverty, compared to 22-percent nationally.
But Marc Homer with the Wyoming Children’s Action Alliance says those numbers can be misleading.
“We’re doing better than the rest of the nation, but we’ve had set-backs,” Homer said. “Over the years, from 2005 to 2010, we’ve had a 27-percent increase in the percentage of children living in poverty.”
Child-related deaths are also nearly twice as common in Wyoming than in the country as a whole.
Still, the state ranked 19th in the nation in terms of over-all child well-being.