PROVIDENCE – Many of Rhode Island’s families were already living from one paycheck to the next prior to the pandemic taking over the economy nine months ago. However, a new report says Black and Latinx Rhode Islanders are even less likely to make ends meet.
In a no-frills budget that includes the cost of housing, food, transportation, health care, child care, among other basic necessities, 52% of all Rhode Island single adults earned less than the required $30,600 to get by, according to the Rhode Island Standard of Need report, which was released by The Economic Progress Institute early Thursday morning.
The Institute releases a RISN report every two years.
When broken down by race, the disparities were even more stark. Of Latinx single adult households, 72% earned less than the required income to afford the essentials, compared to 59% of Black single adult households, 56% Asian single adult households and 49% white single adult households.
“We know it is expensive to live in Rhode Island and many individuals do not have the necessary income to meet their basic needs” said Rachel Flum, executive director of The Economic Progress Institute, in a statement.
In addition, 91% of Latinx single-parent family households earned less than the required $66,057 annual income to afford the no-frills budget, compared to 63% of white single-parent family households in Rhode Island.
The report also highlighted how additional federal and state support helped Rhode Islanders, specifically those who were considered essential workers during the pandemic, meet the cost of the most basic needs.
Many workers deemed as “essential” during the coronavirus pandemic are lower-wage earners, where Latinx and Black workers are overrepresented, said the report.
Some of these workers include child care and direct care workers, cleaning staff in hospitals and other public places, delivery drivers, stock clerks and cashiers at grocery stores. Many of these workers could not work from home and had to put themself at risk while going to work each day.
“This year we wanted to show the realities that COVID has brought to light – that many of the workers who are essential to our economy aren’t paid enough to meet their own basic needs,” said Flum. “We also wanted to highlight that while many workers struggle to keep up with their bills, Black and Latinx workers are faring far worse than white workers.”
She added, “Targeted interventions are needed to turn this trend around.”
The report provided examples how child care assistance, health insurance subsidies and SNAP benefits could benefit a parent pulling in an annual income that was only slightly over the poverty level. However, the report also said there is a gap for a family with earnings closer to two and half times the poverty line because they are typically ineligible for some of these governmental programs.
The report said the Federal Poverty Level, which was created in the 1960s, is an outdated measure of economic security. The FPL was originally designed to measure the economic security of a household based on the cost of food and then the largest household expense.
In recent years, housing and child care costs make up the largest share of a family’s budget, and the FPL does not factor in how work support programs help families meet certain expenses, said the report.
Throughout the pandemic, the federal CARES Act and some other additional government programs were introduced to help provide support for Americans whose jobs were impacted by the pandemic. The report said the additional unemployment funds and SNAP benefits in the last year not only helped those left jobless, but the Rhode Island economy as well.
“More money in their pockets meant more local spending, to the benefit of local businesses,” said the report.
The full report can be found here.
Alexa Gagosz is a PBN staff writer. Contact her at Gagosz@PBN.com. You may also follow her on Twitter at @AlexaGagosz.
