Vulnerability and Poverty Risk Under Drought and COVID-19 in the American Southwest: A Reexamination of SDG1

The first global goal of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda (SDG 1) calls for addressing poverty as a condition produced through social vulnerability and environmental risk. This paper examines the relationship between vulnerability and poverty during concurrent drought and pandemic hazards in 2021 in the American Southwest, a context less studied in sustainability research. Drawing on disaster scholarship, we conceptualize the risk of poverty as the interaction of hazard exposure and social vulnerability. We construct a county-level dataset integrating environmental, epidemiological, and social indicators across Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah, identifying income inequality and residential segregation as key dimensions of vulnerability. Using child poverty as a measurement lens, we apply spatial mapping alongside Relative and Attributable Risk metrics to assess how drought intensity, pandemic burden, and structural vulnerability contributed to spatially uneven poverty outcomes under dual hazards. Results indicate that drought had a stronger effect than COVID-19, yet pre-existing vulnerabilities were more consequential, with income inequality outweighing segregation, suggesting that hazards are most damaging where social inequalities limit resilience. Interpreting the results through the Capability Approach, we posit that sustainable poverty reduction requires not just income support and hazard mitigation, but expansion of instrumental economic, social, and political freedoms that enhance individuals’ capabilities to navigate risk and pursue long-term well-being.