Supporting working families in South King County

Imagine you are offered a promotion that doubles your salary. After the initial giddiness, you might think about buying a new home or car, making an investment, and saving for your children. But what if that hard-earned raise never helped your financial bottom line or advanced your dreams of building assets for your family?

It might sound strange, but this is the reality of the working poor.

Parts of South King County, such as Renton and Kent, are booming, making it all the more difficult for the working poor. This struggle is evident when the income of a single parent earning minimum wage is entered into a self-sufficiency calculator created by the Workforce Development Council of King County. The calculator produces figures that reveal wages needed to be self-sufficient in a growing economy that requires more to make ends meet.

The calculator shows, for example, a single mother of two working in a minimum-wage job in Renton is eligible for work support — childcare subsidies, health insurance, food stamps and tax credits — that allows her family to barely get by.

However, if you double this single mother's wages to $16 per hour, the annual rate of about twice the federal poverty level, she is no longer eligible for many work supports that she had with a minimum-wage job. This makes her financial bottom line negligible.

Imagine the frustration of dashed hopes — net gains and future dreams canceled. There is something wrong with this scenario in this country touted as the land of opportunity.

Our state's low unemployment rate creates a false security, masking the circumstances of low-income families.

The reality is that a quarter of all jobs in our economy do not pay enough for a family to break the poverty threshold. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that 18 of the 30 jobs that will have the largest share of job growth for the next eight years are low-wage or very-low-wage. To make matters worse, many offer little or no benefits.

Taxpayers must pick up the slack. Thousands of hardworking Americans struggle to provide for their families, with their children left to bear and inherit the burden. The cost of persistent poverty to the economy is $500 billion each year, according to the Center for American Progress.

The growing inequality between income classes points to major systems that are broken and need to be fixed in order to support America's working families.

Some positive actions have been taken. Our state Legislature took a huge step in systems reform, providing affordable health-care options to every child in our state. Unfortunately, work-support cuts continue for low-income families on the federal level.

We can, and must, do more, such as supporting the strategies recommended by The Center for American Progress, a nonpartisan organization of leaders who believe the United States can cut poverty in half by:

• Expanding earned income and child tax credits.

• Guarantee child-care assistance for more low-income families.

• Provide more-affordable housing in opportunity-rich areas.

• Restore federal youth opportunity grants.

• Increase accessible post-secondary opportunities and grants for high-school students.

• Develop re-entry services that focus on consistent employment opportunities.

• Strengthen the safety net with food stamps and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) reforms.

• Increase credits and matches for those who save money to help build assets.

While leaders in Washington state have taken some action in these areas, there is still more work to be done.

It is time to start the conversation to reward the hard work and realize the dreams of working families. We are fortunate that the prosperity train has arrived in South King County. Let us work together to make sure that all families have a chance to get onboard.

Karan Gill is the government and public-relations manager at BuRSST for Prosperity (www.BuRSST.org), sponsored by the Children's Home Society of Washington and based in the Old Renton City Hall. He can be contacted at karang@chs-wa.org