We signed it, and the tribe started moving ahead. . . . I was going to stay with it or buy the rest of it out. It is only in the past three years that the gambling dividend has been large enough to significantly improve the average tribal member's standing. As a result, many are just now emerging from poverty. A smattering of available statistics give some indication of the lot of the average Seminole.
Unemployment remains high.
By the tribe's estimation, it may be 20 percent. The federal government has pumped millions into tribal housing, improving living conditions but creating developments marked by a bland uniformity and small floor plans. School dropout rates are high. The tribe boasts that it will pick up the cost of college for any Seminole who wants it, but a study in 1992 reported that only 1 percent of the tribe's youths actually earn a college degree. Reservation life provides no immunity from the problems of troubled families.