Poverty gets new analysis

Nearly six years after changes to the nation's welfare policy, poverty remains a major problem in Indiana, according to the 2002 Indiana Self-Sufficiency Standard, released last Tuesday.\nThe study comes at a precipitous economic moment in the state. Indiana is currently running an $850 million dollar deficit, national unemployment rates stand at an eight-year high and claims for social programs that serve low income and working class families are increasing as funds and eligibility for these programs, such as childcare assistance, are cut.\nCommissioned by the Indiana Coalition on Housing and Homeless Issues the study updates similar research conducted in 1998 and provides a different benchmark for measuring poverty other than the federally established guideline. The study measures how much different families units -- for example, a single adult with an infant and a preschooler or two adults with a preschooler -- in different areas of the state must earn, through earnings and government programs, to meet basic needs. Unlike calculations of poverty based on guidelines set by the federal government, this study includes costs of housing, child care, food, transportation, healthcare and other necessities. \n"The official level is outdated. The poverty level was created in the mid 1960s based on a basic program. Take the cost of food and make food a third of your costs," Beryl Cohen, a project director for ICHHI, said. "In the 1960s when it was created, two parents were in the home, which is no longer typical. There's nothing (in the official poverty level) about child care, nothing about geography, nothing about the ages in the family."\nDiana Pearce, a professor at the University of Washington who has researched sufficiency standards for other states and testified before Congress, conducted the study on Indiana. She also thought that the federal poverty level was not a reliable indicator of poverty.\n"With the Self-Sufficiency Standard, we find a different view of poverty. We get a much more nuanced view of who is poor and what people need to meet basic needs," Pearce said. "My guess is we're going to find two to three times as many people who don't have adequate income when comparing the official poverty level with the self-sufficiency standard."\nAccording to the study, child care and housing needs are the most expensive costs for families. Cohen gave the example of a single adult in the Bloomington area with an infant and a preschooler. To achieve self-sufficiency, this adult would have to earn at least $17 per hour to be self-sufficient. Childcare costs $970 for two kids per month in Bloomington, according to the study. Of course, that same family unit could be self-sufficient on a lower wage if they had childcare assistance. \n"It's hard for people to understand how much basic needs really cost," Cohen said. "If you don't have children in childcare, you won't know it can cost between $300 and $500 dollars a month for childcare. That can be eye opening for people."\nICHHI's study is tied, in many ways, to changes in welfare policy enacted under former President Clinton in 1997. Under that plan, the guaranteed income for low income workers was discarded and welfare rolls plummeted as former recipients entered into the entry-level job market. States used block grants from the federal government to establish job training, childcare and other programs to support former recipients. But with the economic downturn, some of these programs are already in jeopardy. \nIndiana's child care assistance program, for example, dropped 6,700 families from the program in October, as other claims for that funding increased with the sluggish economy. \nBut these work supports, including food stamps, childcare assistance and Medicaid, are crucial for families to achieve self-sufficiency, according to the study, especially if the higher wage jobs are unavailable. \n"Many of these families that have trouble making ends meet, even when they have jobs and even when they're above minimum wage," Pearce said. "That kind of wage isn't enough to meet needs. These families face choices between paying for, say childcare and rent or healthcare and food."\nLocally, the unemployment rate stood at 2.9 percent in November -- one of the lowest rates in Indiana -- when the last figures were released said Richard Rampley, a program director of Bloomington's Indiana's Workforce Development office. Rampley said he was optimistic about the city's job market. \n"We have a well-educated workforce in Bloomington," Rampley said. "It seems as if things are slowly starting to move forward. We have seen a few more requests for job hires from employers, but instead of climbing by 30 or 60 new hires, we're seeing 30 to 33 instead. We're seeing much smaller increases."\nRampley's office helps coordinate job trainings and searches and workshops on how to build a resume and address "skill deficiencies," which must be addressed to access better jobs, he said.\n"There are some higher paying, high skill jobs that are coming into the community, but they're not coming in fast enough. They do require skills," Rampley said. "We spend a lot of time helping people developing those skills."\nPearce said that while the study did not reveal anything particularly unique about Indiana in comparison to other states, she did say the studies, this one included, reveal that expenses are more than people usually think.\n"These are bare bones budget. There's no happy meals, no pizzas, no lattes," Pearce said. "Unless we push up wages and provide supports, it's totally unfair to families to hold out the promise that finding a job is the answer"