Gay poor

Pathways Into Poverty: Lived experiences among LGBTQ people.

[3]Wilson and Badgett (2020). Coupled with the higher rates of poverty among people of color, when someone is both part of a sexual minority group and is a person of color, they have a much higher chance of living in poverty compared to both White counterparts and cis straight members of their own ethnic or racial group.

Glossary of Terms

Bisexual: A person emotionally, romantically or sexually attracted to more than one sex, gender, or gender identity though not necessarily simultaneously, in the same way or to the same degree.

While many also identify as transgender, not all non-binary people do. Being transgender does not imply any specific sexual orientation. Non-binary people may identify as being both a man and a woman, somewhere in between, or as falling completely outside these categories.

This is also true when comparing cis straight women and cis lesbians. By comparison, 28.4% of gay and bisexual men and transgender men reported living with a disability, as did 35.4% of lesbian and bisexual women and transgender women.

Camila, 24, Latinx, LA, bisexual trans woman
“I’ve been denied jobs before because I’m trans, and I think it’s affected me emotionally to the point where even if I didn’t have a physical disability, I don’t think that mentally I’m prepared to work because of all of the things that I’ve been through related to me being trans.

Women and non-binary people may use this term to describe themselves.
LGBT: An acronym for “lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender.”
Non-binary: An adjective describing a person who does not identify exclusively as a man or a woman. They may end up homeless, couch surfing, or in foster care, all of which can make finishing high school difficult, and are predictors of future poverty.

So she would go to one, two, at least four food banks I know of.”[6]

For the LGBT adults living in poverty who did not grow up poor, other conditions were at play that started their pathway into poverty. Therefore, transgender people may identify as straight, gay, lesbian, bisexual, etc.

Adapted from the Human Rights Campaign, Glossary of terms.

As CUSA celebrates Pride 2024, we also bring awareness to the pressing fact that—particularly where queer identity intersects with other factors in economic oppression, like race, gender, generational family poverty, or geographic location—LGBTQIA+ people in the U.S. and Canada face the same socioeconomic challenges that straight residents face, with more obstacles to boot.

Unraveling the Myth of Gay Affluence

According to a 2021 University of Wisconsin–Madison Institute for Research on Poverty study, people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or trans “have higher rates of poverty compared to cis [from cisgender, meaning “identifying with the gender assigned to one at birth”] heterosexual people, about 22% to 16% respectively.” Further, the study found that “[r]ates of poverty for LGBT people of color are close to, or higher than, those for cis straight people of their own racial or ethnic group, and are notably higher than for White people, whether straight or LGBT.”

Despite this outlook, the myth of “gay affluence” persists.

The general population also saw a decrease in poverty. This survey used a module of SOGI questions in 35 states from 2014 to 2017 and provides insights into the lived experiences of people who are cisgender straight men and women, cisgender gay men and lesbian women, cisgender bisexual men and women, and transgender people. When asked to evaluate the condition of their health, cisgender straight women had the most positive assessments, with only 18.2% rating it as just fair or poor.

These findings, and the limitation of examining economic status through a health survey, underscore the importance of adding measures of sexual orientation and gender identity to federal surveys, including the Current Population Survey (CPS), the American Community Survey (ACS), and the Decennial Census.
Download the full report

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Research and implementation of policy and cultural changes can help to ensure that LGBT people have the same opportunities to thrive as their cisgender straight counterparts.
Compiled and edited by Judith Siers-Poisson.
[1]Badgett, M.V.L and Wilson, B.D.M.

Cis straight women, cis lesbian women, and cis bisexual men comprise a second group at 17.8%, 17.9% and 19.5%, respectively. They were followed by cis straight men (16.7%), cis bisexual men (20.7%), and transgender men (24.9%).
SOGI and the experience of childhood poverty
Another component of the Pathways to Justice Project is a report detailing the lived experience of LGBT people in poverty[5].

Pathways Into Poverty: Lived experiences among LGBTQ people.
Categories
Child Poverty, Children, Employment, Employment General, Family & Partnering, Family & Partnering General, Health, Health General, Inequality & Mobility, Racial/Ethnic Inequality
Tags
Disability, LGBT, Race/Ethnicity

LGBT Poverty in the United States
This study serves as an update to the 2019 LGBT Poverty in the United States report (which used data from 2014-2017), as well as an assessment of changes in LGBT poverty in relation to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic—a globally historic period of time that impacted the health and economics of the world’s population.

We didn’t have a lot of things. I probably still have my kids if that was the case.”[2]
Race is a key indicator of economic hardship in the United States, and cisgender straight men and women are more likely to be White than their LGBT counterparts: 66% to 61% respectively.