Cleveland’s poverty rate fell to its lowest level in more than four decades in 2025, but not all racial and ethnic groups benefitted according to a report by the Center for Community Solutions. 

Cleveland’s poverty rate was 24.1% in 2025, according to the center’s analysis, published Monday, of recently released U.S. Census data. The year before, it was 28.3%.

“This is the first time since the 1980s that fewer than one-quarter of Cleveland residents are living in poverty,” said Emily Campbell, the center’s president and CEO. 

 “It is an indication that our community is trending in the right direction,” she said. “There are more people who are able to earn a family-sustaining wage or earn a wage that takes them above poverty.”

The increase wasn’t enough to change Cleveland’s second-place ranking for poverty rates among large U.S. cities. Detroit was first. The U.S. poverty rate was 11.8% in 2025.

White Clevelanders, by far, saw the largest decline in the poverty rate and Black residents saw a smaller decline. The poverty rates for the city’s Hispanic/Latino residents stayed about the same, but they rose for Asian residents.

These trends placed Cleveland on two top 10 worst big cities lists, one for the Asian poverty rate and the other for the Hispanic/Latino poverty rate.

“Racism is certainly a piece of it,” Campbell said of the disparity in poverty rates when white Clevelanders are compared to Asian, Black and Hispanic residents. “Lack of opportunity, challenges in education and employment, transportation and all kinds of things can work together to make it more difficult for our neighbors who are people of color to take advantage of the opportunities that may be available in our community.”

Decades of disinvestment in minority neighborhoods has played a role in Cleveland’s high poverty rates, which will take time and a multifaceted approach to reverse, wrote Tyler Sinclair, a spokesman for Mayor Justin Bibb’s administration, in an email to Signal Cleveland. 

Sinclair wrote that Bibb’s administration has been “laser-focused on tackling generational poverty through a combination of initiatives focused on affordable housing, workforce development, and neighborhood-level investments, as well as creating economic opportunities, improved access to education and better healthcare for low-income families.”

The Site Readiness for Good Jobs Fund, which aims to bring 25,000 good-paying jobs to Cleveland by revitalizing vacant or underutilized industrial land, is among the ways the city is hoping to lower the poverty rate, he said. Much of the land is in mostly Black neighborhoods on the city’s East Side.

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A little more than 85,000 of Cleveland’s 353,400 residents had household incomes below the poverty threshold, which is $32,649 for a family of four, Campbell said.  

White residents, who already had the city’s lowest poverty rate, also had the steepest drop in poverty. Their 10.5% poverty rate was down 32.6% between 2024 and 2025. Cleveland’s overall poverty rate fell by about 14% during the period.

In recent years, a lot of high-end and market-rate housing has been built or is planned for downtown and in other Cleveland neighborhoods. The new downtown housing, for example, has tended to draw a higher percentage of white residents than exists in the city as whole, according to a 2023 report done by the Downtown Cleveland Alliance and the Greater Cleveland Partnership. That report found that more than 56% of downtown residents were white. About 35% of the city’s population is white, according to census data. Could these newer and more affluent residents account for the decrease in white and overall poverty rates?

Campbell said it is unlikely.  

“It doesn’t appear that there’s this influx of white residents, who are not in poverty, that is driving those numbers down,” she said. 

Cleveland’s poverty rate has been falling for a couple of years, which is similar to trends in other big cities, Campbell said. For example, Cleveland’s poverty rate in 2015 was more than 36%, according to U.S. Census figures.

“Something in our economy is helping more families be above that poverty threshold,” she said. 

But the data on which the poverty rates are based doesn’t measure such things, she said. For example, it doesn’t show if more residents are getting jobs that pay “family-sustaining wages,” Campbell said. The center’s analysis is based on the latest available U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey data, which was released a few weeks ago, she said. The survey collects economic, housing and other data from a sample of households across the 50 states, Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico.

The Black poverty rate was 28.2%, the analysis found. That represents about a 17% decrease between 2024 and 2025. Cleveland had the second highest Black poverty rate among large U.S. cities. Detroit was first.

“That is an indicator that I would say is trending in the right direction, but we still have a long distance to go,” Campbell said of the decrease in Cleveland’s Black poverty rate.

Asian and Hispanic Clevelanders have the highest poverty rates of major U.S. cities

The Hispanic/Latino poverty rate at 32.6% basically remained unchanged between 2024 and 2025. The Asian poverty rate at 44.7%, increased about 10%.

About 13% of Cleveland’s population is Hispanic and under 3% is Asian, according to the census. Among smaller populations, sometimes relatively small shifts can make a statistical difference. Still, there is reason for concern, Campbell said.

“The gap between white residents and Hispanic, Black and Asian residents is large,” she said. “It’s going to take sustained improvement over the course of several years to undo decades and decades of challenge,” Campbell said.

For example, Cleveland has had the worst Asian poverty rate of any large city since at least 2021, she said.

Harry Kamdar, CEO of Asian Services in Action, whose service area includes Cleveland and Akron, is concerned that two Ohio cities – Cleveland and Cincinnati – are on the top 10 list for big cities with the worst Asian poverty rates. 

”Ohio’s Asian population faces barriers to socioeconomic stability such as language barriers and lack of state investment that limits the opportunities for community members to leave poverty,” he wrote in an email to Signal Cleveland. “Reducing the poverty rate for all communities in Ohio requires strategy and intention that address each community’s unique struggles and history.” 

He said Ohio needs to form a statewide commission to help tackle the issue. 

José C. Feliciano Sr., chair of the Hispanic Roundtable, found the study’s findings alarming.

“The poverty rate among Cleveland’s Hispanic community is deeply troubling and should be a wake-up call for all of us,” he wrote in an email to Signal Cleveland. He said the reasons for the disparities in poverty rates are complex.

“We recognize that language barriers can play a significant role, limiting access to educational opportunities, employment, essential services, and the information necessary for families to improve their economic circumstances,” he wrote. “But the challenges go well beyond language.

He said the Hispanic Roundtable is “doubling down on our commitment to addressing these disparities.” They’re doing it for the Hispanic community, but also for Cleveland.

“We cannot be satisfied with Cleveland’s overall economic progress if Hispanic families are being left behind,” he wrote. “Our community deserves not simply a better poverty statistic, but a genuine opportunity to participate in and benefit from Cleveland’s economic growth.”

 

Credit:

By: Olivera Perkins

Article: Cleveland's poverty rate lowest since 1980s, but gains are uneven