Report: 38% of New Jersey Households Are Not Meeting Basic Needs

You can’t have everything you want (or need) in ALICE’S New Jersey

1.2 million New Jersey households, including 890,000 households with employed adults (28% of the states population) are not making ends meet, according to a report released by the United Way of Northern New Jersey.

The working poor are dubbed as Asset Limited, Income Constrained and Employed (ALICE) by the UWNNJ. These are families of four earning less than $62,000 and single adults earning less than $28,000…the income levels needed to provide housing, food, child care, health care and transportation in New Jersey according to the report.

The report says that 53% of all jobs in New Jersey pay less than $20 per hour or $40,000 per year.

71% of ALICE households are white. 31% are in the prime wage earning years of 45-64.

85% of New Jersey’s 560 towns have 20% of their population struggling to survive.

The study is based on data through 2012 and does not fully measure the impact that Superstorm Sandy had on New Jersey’s economy.

The Great Recession may have ended nationally, but New Jersey’s economy continued to contract through 2012, according to the report.

In Monmouth County, 33% of households are ALICE. 24% of Asian households in Monmouth County are classified as ALICE. 54% of Black households, 55% of Hispanic households and 30% of White households in Monmouth are also ALICE. 40% of Monmouth County seniors are not earning the $40,000 needed to surpass the ALICE threshold in the county.

The report concludes that government assistance and private charity are essential in the short term for ALICE households to bridge the gap between their needs and their earnings.

Long term, structural reform to make New Jersey more affordable and provide better income opportunities are necessary. The report calls for both private and public sector job growth, including attracting new industries.

How to do that? The report doesn’t say. But it does say in order to make ends meet, New Jersey families need two wage earner making $15.38 per hour.

Read the entire ALICE Report here.