In Wisconsin politics we find a wide range of understanding about the real, material conditions of our working class. It’s fair to say that a large segment of the people who will be voting in November actually believe that our working class is doing well, official unemployment numbers are low, there are “lots of jobs going unfilled” and so on.
This sort of opinion is not supported by social sciences and the data which they make available. Perhaps the best source of “big data” in social sciences which show the true situation of Wisconsin’s working people, including the working poor and the super-poor (the chronically underemployed or unemployable people) is the ALICE study, short for Asset-Limited, Income-Constrained, Employed persons, done by the United Way, in 11 different states of the nation.
The Wisconsin cohort was done in 2016, and shows some stark numbers of “ALICE” people in many of our counties. If you click on the link below, a PDF file should open in your browser. The County pages are at the end of the report, and 72 counties are covered, with most cities, townships and villages separately reported.
Using this data you may be able to correct some of your own, and some of your friends, family and co-workers, misconceptions about the real “Condition of the Working Class in Wisconsin” in these times.
Green People's Media 