CHILD POVERTY IN WISCONSIN INCREASES
A definitive new report by one of the top poverty research centers in the country reveals that in 2016 Wisconsin poverty increased by over 10% and child poverty increased by a shocking 20%.
You can read more about the report and what it means for our campaign to end child poverty in Wisconsin on a new section of the End Child Poverty Wisconsin website. On that page, we’ll be posting information about poverty in Wisconsin and the U.S. you can use to show others in your community why this effort is so important.
It is significant that this increase in poverty in Wisconsin happened at a period when overall employment in Wisconsin was expanding. While Wisconsin was adding jobs at a rate slower than many of our neighboring states and the nation as a whole, we did add jobs in 2016.
That poverty increased in 2016 demonstrates that the economic expansion is not helping those at the bottom of the economic ladder. The vast majority of people living in poverty are part of working families, and many work multiple jobs. The problem is that the wages they earn, and the number of hours they are able to work, keep these working families in poverty.
The Wisconsin Poverty Report reinforces the need to adopt the goals of the End Child Poverty Campaign. First, we must adopt the goal of halving the level of child poverty, and racial disparities in child poverty, over the next ten years.
Second, in order to do that, we must implement policies and programs at the scale necessary to achieve that goal. And third, we must hold ourselves accountable by tracking our progress toward achieving that goal.
Letters to your local newspaper about the campaign – like this one – can help build awareness of the urgency and opportunity for ending child poverty in Wisconsin.
We’ve passed the 3,000 endorsement mark – almost a third of the way to our goal – but it will take more outreach by supporters like you to get us the rest of the way. Why not send a short letter to your local newspaper highlighting the findings of this report and encouraging readers to endorse the vision?
On December 14th, 2017, a coalition of faith-based networks and anti-poverty groups held concurrent announcements in multiple cities of a bold new campaign to end child poverty in Wisconsin. The campaign seeks to inspire Wisconsin to set a goal of eliminating child poverty, by holding itself accountable for reducing both child poverty and racial disparities by half in the next decade.
The campaign is a product of 3 years of intensive policy discussions and moral reflection at 24 churches and other religious institutions throughout Wisconsin. The lead coalition partners are four statewide organizations: WISDOM, Wisconsin Council of Churches, Kids Forward, and Citizen Action of Wisconsin Education Fund.
By End Child Poverty Wisconsin Team