FAST FACTS about homelessness and housing in New Jersey

• According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, nationwide roughly 22 million households rent. Of those, roughly nine million renter households pay half or more of their income for housing although the generally accepted affordability standard is that no more than 30% of income should go toward rent. Out of Reach 2006
  
  
• According to the annual Hunger and Homelessness Survey of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the lack of affordable housing was cited by 87% of respondents as the primary cause of family homelessness. For singles, 65% of respondents cited mental illness as the most common cause of homelessness.
  
  
• The lack of affordable housing continues to be an issue in New Jersey as it is everywhere in this country.
  Here are a few highlights from the NLIHC's Out Of Reach 2006 report
  
  
  - New Jersey remains fourth on the list of most expensive jurisdictions
    in this country in which to rent.
  
  - Here, a worker earning the minimum wage ($7.15 per hour) must work
    two full time and one part time jobs in order to afford a studio
    apartment at the Bergen-Passaic area's Fair Market rent.
  
  - An SSI recipient (receiving $634 monthly) can afford a monthly rent of
    no more than $190, while the Bergen-Passaic Fair Market Rent
    for a studio apartment is now $1,001.
  
  - The Housing Wage in the Bergen-Passaic area is $19.25.
    This is the amount a full-time (40 hours per week) worker must earn
    per hour in order to afford a studio apartment at the area's
    Fair Market rent.
  
  
  
• After being stuck at $5.15 an hour for nearly a decade, Congress finally passed the long overdue increase in the minimum wage.  The President signed the bill into law on May 25, 2007.   The increase will occur in three increments, with the first raise to $5.85 in July followed a year later by another 70-cent increase to $6.55, and finally reaching $7.25 in 2009. 
  
  
• According to the Economic Policy Institute , an estimated 13 million workers (10 percent of the workforce) will be positively affected by the most recent increase in the minimum wage.  Of these workers, 5.6 million people who currently earn less than $7.25 will directly benefit from the raise, and 7.4 million workers earning wages slightly above $7.25 are expected to reap indirect benefits by the increase due to plausible “spillover effects.”
  
  
• But in real terms, this means that a single mother of two working full time for a minimum wage of $7.25 per hour earns $15,080 per year, less than the 2008 Health and Human Services Poverty Guideline of $17,600 for a family of three. This is hardly a “living wage”. SOURCE:  Federal Register, Vol. 73, No. 15, January 23, 2008, pp. 3971–3972
  
  
• "Supportive housing is cost effective, affordable and decent; it maximizes tenant independence and provides peer support." (Corporation for Supportive Housing) Find out more about the cost of homelessness.
  
  

Updated February 2008