The average worker makes less than they need to afford a two-bedroom home in practically every state in the country. However, in one section of the country, a family’s required earnings to keep a roof over their heads is practically enormous.
The National Low Income Housing Coalition released its annual “Out of Reach” study, which details the enormous disparity between renters’ salaries and housing costs across the United States. The research used a statistic known as the housing wage to determine how pricey rental housing is. This is the minimum hourly wage a worker needs earn in order to afford a home at fair market rent without having to spend more than a third of their income on housing. The housing wage for a two-bedroom home or apartment at fair market rent in San Francisco is a stunning $68.33 per hour, about $10 higher than the following city. That amount is nearly three times greater than the national average two-bedroom housing wage of $24.90. Indeed, California is home to eight of the top ten most expensive metropolitan areas for rental housing:
The Metropolitan Area
Wage for a two-bedroom home (hourly)
San Francisco is a city in California.
$68.33
California cities of San Jose, Sunnyvale, and Santa Clara
$58.67
Santa Cruz-Watsonville is a city in the state of California.
$58.10
Oakland-Fremont, California is a city in the state of California.
$45.83
Santa Barbara-Santa Maria
$45.65
Boston, Cambridge, and Quincy, Massachusetts
$44.92
Santa Ana, Anaheim, and Irvine, California
$44.83
San Diego-Carlsbad, California is a city in the state of California.
$40.85
Honolulu, Hawaii is a city in the state of Hawaii.
$39.87
California, Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale
$39.58
California is also the most costly state in terms of the “housing wage” required to rent a home. The state’s average wage is $39.03. To purchase a fair-market two-bedroom home, a minimum-wage worker would have to work 112 hours each week, nearly three full-time jobs. Californians, believe it or not, may not have it the worst, as earnings in the state are generally greater than in other regions of the country. The highest disparity between the real average wage for renters and the two-bedroom housing wage is seen in Hawaii. Renters on the island state make $20.13 per hour less than they would need to make to avoid spending more than a third of their income on housing alone. According to the survey, “eleven of the twenty major occupations in the United States pay a lower median hourly earnings than what a full-time worker would need to purchase a modest apartment at the national average fair market rent.” Retail employees, secretaries, financial clerks, and home health aides are among those affected. People of color are disproportionately paid incomes that make housing unaffordable, and they are more likely to work in low-wage industries. Even if a renter lives in one of the most affordable sections of the country in terms of housing costs, there’s a good chance they won’t be able to afford it. The survey stated that “many jurisdictions with lower-than-average Housing Wages still suffer from a shortage of affordable rental homes.” “Low Housing Wages are associated with less vigorous economies and lower-than-average household incomes, implying that a low Housing Wage is still out of reach for too many households.”/n
