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Majority of Elderly Women Living Without Economic Security
Findings released today reveal that 60% of older women across the country lack the incomes to meet basic expenses. Based on the Elder Economic Security Standard™ Index (Elder Index), comprehensive data that defines the basic expenses facing retired adults over the age of 65, Wider Opportunities for Women’s (WOW) new brief explores how older women are faring in this economy. According to the Elder Index, the income older adults need to reach economic security ranges from $19,000 a year to $29,000 a year, depending on the individual’s housing situation. This gender-based study is the first in a report series, “Doing Without: Economic Insecurity and Older Americans,” that WOW is releasing this spring.
+ Full Document (PDF)
See also: Doing Without: Economic Insecurity and Older Americans — No. 1: Ranking of the States
Basic Economic Security Tables Initiative
Basic Economic Security Tables Initiative
Source: Wider Opportunities for Women
The Basic Economic Security Tables™ Index (BEST) is a measure of the basic needs and assets workers require for economic security throughout a lifetime and across generations.
The BEST follows on a long history of research defining families’ spending and income needs, but reflects a modern economy and contemporary understanding of how families achieve financial stability. The BEST addresses the several pieces of the larger basic economic security picture—basic needs, savings and employment-based benefits—and allows a broad and complete view of worker needs and families’ prospects for achieving the economic security so critical to their futures and to their communities.
BEST values have been calculated for the United States and six state and regions to assist policymakers, researchers, advocates and media who assess the status of the nation’s workers, the needs of America’s families, and the state of the nation—today and in coming years. The US BEST also serves as benchmark for state and county BEST Indexes and provides context for state and local policy discussions. BEST data increases awareness of the challenges faced by hard working American families and points to important policies and jobs that allow these families to build and achieve economic security.
The Basic Economic Security Tables ™ (BEST) for United States
The Basic Economic Security Tables ™ (BEST) for United States
Source: Wider Opportunities for Women
From press release (PDF):
As Congress works to meet the April 8 deadline for a final budget deal for fiscal year 2011, a new report on family economic security details the challenges that many Americans face in covering their basic expenses and the additional hardships families could suffer as a result of proposed budget cuts. The national Basic Economic Security Tables TM (BEST) Index, developed by Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW), a national organization that works to achieve economic independence for women and their families, finds that single workers need $30,012 a year – nearly twice the federal minimum wage – to cover basic expenses. Single-parents require nearly twice the income ($57,756) to support two children, while dual-income households with children require $67,920.
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The Basic Economic Security Tables™ for the United States report, includes the comprehensive BEST Index that calculates the monthly income necessary for families to cover their basic expenses, including childcare, housing, health care, transportation, savings and retirement.The BEST also demonstrates the challenges facing families trying to achieve economic security in the years ahead. The report finds that jobs created in the coming years will not provide economic security wages to the majority of workers who do not have 4-year college degrees. Fewer than 13% of jobs the US Department of Labor expects to be created by 2018 are likely to provide economic security to a single parent raising two or more children. A small majority of new jobs are expected to pay economic security wages for single workers without children, and approximately 43% of the new jobs will pay economic security wages for two workers raising two young children.
+ Full Report (PDF)