So a recent study done by United Way found that 34.7 million families are making less than what’s needed “to survive in the modern economy.” And even though the economy has improved vastly since the Great Recession, about 43% of households are still struggling to afford housing, food, child care, health care, transportation, and a cell phone. It also noted that 66% of jobs pay under $20 an hour. And the study even went as far as to look at individual counties in the US, determine what the survivable budget would be and calculate the minimum hourly wage for those areas. For example, in 2016 in Seattle’s King County the budget for a family of 4 would be ~85k, an hourly wage of $42.46, but only 14% of jobs pay more than $40 an hour in that area.

So essentially, we have a growing number of employed people who can’t afford basic necessities like food and housing. And that number is almost half the country according to this study.

Does this worry anyone else?