Released: February 21, 2023

Why the South has such low credit scores

Source: Andrew Van Dam, Washington Post (Paid Registration)

Almost every corner of America’s most populous region — every race, every income bracket — appears to have low credit scores. The reason why credit scores are so low in the South has gotta be connected to medical debt, because that’s the most common type of unpaid bill that people have,” said Breno Braga at the Urban Institute.

Of the 11 states that have yet to expand Medicaid, eight sit in the South, according to KFF, a San Francisco health-policy nonprofit. Southerners were more likely to be behind on medical debt even before the ACA, but the reluctance among the region’s mostly Republican governors to participate in the Medicaid expansion has increased the gaps between the South and the rest of the country.

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