摘要：Currently, approximately 38 million people across the U.S. live in poverty1(O'Hare,1996). Many of these families rely on public assistance or welfare as their primary means ofsupport. Poverty is often perceived as an urban issue. Rural poverty does not get as much mediaattention as urban poverty, but facts show that there are many rural areas (i.e., small towns, smallcommunities, farm communities, and non-metropolitan areas) that have very high rates of poverty(Miller, 1998). Many of the poor do reside in inner cities of metropolitan areas, but the rate orincidence of poverty is in fact higher among families, female-headed households, and relatedchildren in non-metropolitan counties (Goetz and Freshwater, 1997). The South, a region with aheavy welfare burden, faces a tremendous challenge of reducing dependency and rural povertygiven that one-third of the rural poor live in the South.
