California has reached a poverty rate that is now twice as bad as West Virginia’s and substantially worse than the rates of poverty in Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas and Texas, according to a new measure of poverty developed by the federal Census Bureau

Roughly 8.8 million people in California were poor during between 2009 and 2011, when Democrats controlled the state legislature and governorship, as well as the White House. The least poor states tend to be the unglamorous, undiverse and sprawling communities close to Canada. Iowa, Vermont, Nebraska, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming have poverty rates just below 10%. Iowa’s rate is the lowest in the nation, at 8.4%, roughly one-third California’s poverty rate.