By Samantha Strong
Herald contributor
While poverty affects all who experience it, the impact is oftentimes harder on women.
There are many reasons for this outcome, according to a 2017 study from the Women’s Fund of the Oshkosh Area Community Foundation, including the fact that women typically earn less than men. That wage gap compounded over time adds up to a significant amount by the end of a career. Pair that with women often being responsible with the costs of raising children, and even custodial mothers are twice as likely to be poor as custodial fathers.
With women being the more likely victims of domestic and sexual violence, it can push them into a cycle of poverty through related job loss, poor health and homelessness. Women in Oshkosh are equally exposed to these circumstances, especially as government-funded programs geared toward women’s health care continue to see a reduction or halt in funding.
According to the Women’s Fund report, female-headed households in northeast Wisconsin make up the majority of those living below the poverty line – with or without children. Female-headed households account for 28 percent of those in the region, but 59 percent of them fall below that line.
This is largely unchanged from 2009 data. The annual federal poverty line (FPL) for a family size of three – one woman and two children – is $21,330, or $1,777.50 a month.
According to the Basic Economic Security Test (BEST), the income required for security in a three-person household in Winnebago County that has one worker (employed with benefits), one preschooler and a school-age child is $57,800 annually, or an hourly wage of $27. Most full-time jobs in northeast Wisconsin held by women, according to the Women’s Fund report, are considered office and administrative support with a median annual wage of $33,000.
The ALICE (Asset-Limited Income-Constrained Employed) report does not list a survival budget for the same family size but puts a survival budget for a home with two adults, one preschooler and an infant at $64,092 annually, or $32 hourly, between the two adults.
The latest ALICE report states that in 2016 there were 26,294 households in Oshkosh, of which 46 percent are below either the ALICE threshold or FPL.
“It’s easy to say pull yourself up by your bootstraps if you have bootstraps,” Sue Panek, former United Way chief executive, said. “If you don’t know the situation, it’s easy for you to judge, but you don’t know what someone’s going through. We need to educate the community on the dynamics of poverty so they understand how hard people living in poverty actually work.”
City poverty profile
Before the issue of eliminating poverty for Oshkosh women can be dealt with, it’s critical to understand what poverty looks like in the community. Oshkosh is unique in that the city’s geography isn’t large but isn’t too small as a metro area. It’s close enough to bigger cities such as Green Bay or Milwaukee that relocation is manageable, but far enough away that the population is smaller and in turn are fewer people competing for limited resources and benefits.
Even though more than half of the population is considered self-sufficient — enough money to meet basic needs without assistance — there are more people here struggling than in many surrounding communities.
The rise in population is part of the reason Oshkosh has been seeing an uptick in the need for program funding. The city is expanding at a rapid rate while legislative support for governmental programs such as FoodShare, affordable housing assistance and Women, Infants and Children (WIC) remains stagnant.
“Poverty is like a wound, and when it bleeds, it opens you up to predators and it keeps getting worse and worse,” said Teri Horner, financial counselor with FISC, the Financial Information and Service Center. FISC is a program of Goodwill Industries of North Central Wisconsin and offers personal financial counseling.
Horner said that already between January and April there were 168 women and 98 men seeking help from FISC. Over the entirety of 2018, the agency saw 249 women and 107 men.
A majority of the women Horner assists are newly divorced or apart from their significant other due to domestic violence situations.
“A lot of them are struggling to work jobs that are paying minimum wage or just above that, and the cost of day care is killing them,” she said, touching on one of the biggest barriers that many Oshkosh women face: the lack of affordable, reliable child care.
Panek echoed Horner’s concern for the lack of affordable child care but also noted many jobs available don’t have the flexibility needed by women with caregiving responsibilities.
“There are plenty of jobs out there, but again, you have to show up for work and work a full shift,” Panek said. “What happens if that shift goes a little longer or you’re working outside of the hours the bus runs and you need to pick up the kids from day care? There are also plenty of second- and third-shift jobs, but what are you going to do with the kids if you have them?”
Another group of women struggling are those ages 75 and older. They are twice as likely as men in the same age group to be in poverty, according to the Women’s Fund. Although elderly women often qualify for Social Security benefits that keep them above the FPL, they are still at risk.
Forty-six percent of all elderly unmarried females receiving benefits relied on Social Security for 90 percent or more of their income in 2014, and elderly women are less likely than men to have significant family income from pensions. This can often relate to the inequality of wages these women have experienced over their lifetimes.
“When you try to exit poverty, it isn’t just like showing your passport and getting into a different country,” Horner said. “It’s takes a lot of time to get out of poverty, which is something a lot of people don’t understand. This didn’t happen overnight and it’s not going to get solved overnight.”
Housing challenges
Affordable housing is one of the top three barriers Oshkosh women in poverty face. Not having a safe place to stay affects every other aspect of life, according to Matt Johnson, director of the Day By Day Warming Shelter. The overall lack of affordable housing paired with low wages has led to an increased demand for alternate options – including staying in a shelter.
Typically, 20 percent of Day By Day’s guests are women and the rest are men, but Johnson said this year that number is up to 30 percent. Because the shelter does not discriminate against those with substance abuse or mental health issues, children younger than 18 are not allowed, making women with children ineligible to stay there.
The other shelter in Oshkosh — Father Carr’s on North Koeller Street –accepts children but is about 3 miles from the city center, requiring more transportation challenges. If a woman and her children are trying to get there after the city bus stops running, alternatives are taxi or ridesharing such as Uber or Lyft, which require a smartphone and debit/credit card. Women with children can also stay at the Christine Ann Center near downtown, but only if they are fleeing a domestic violence situation.
Day By Day shelter has seen a significant increase in guests. Typically there are 130-140 unique guests each season but in 2018-2019 there were 162, Johnson said. There has also been an increase in transgender clients.
“We’re seeing a lot of new homeless in our system this year,” said Amanda Hammond, Day By Day Shelter operations manager. “They might be coming from somewhere that doesn’t utilize our homeless management system, but I’ve had to add a lot of clients this year – people who have never been homeless before.”
Johnson added, “This also led to an increase in the number of people we had to turn away.”
Hammond and Johnson agree that women are more likely than men to be taken in by family or friends, especially if there are children involved, which influences the number and demographics of clients. Women are also more likely to sustain domestic abuse in order to keep their current housing situation.
Some circumstances special to homeless women include feminine hygiene needs and proper undergarments. While the shelter provides those hygiene products, undergarments such as bras can be more difficult to provide, Hammond noted, due to the variety of sizing and fits.
Day By Day is only seasonal due to its operating agreement with the city and has 25 beds. Once full, guests are given a sleeping bag and a gift card to Hardee’s across the street where they can buy something to remain a customer until the restaurant closes at 10 p.m. The shelter had to turn away 140 guests in its seventh season (2017-2018). Johnson said guests average 31 nights there before finding alternate housing.
While an increase in space would help, Johnson said they would still run into the same problems.
“What happens if we were able to increase our max to 50 and reach it? 75?” Johnson said. “What I see as the real issue here is the quantity of low-income units available.”
Next week: Community resources for the most vulnerable
