Income
As many as 70,000 people in the Midlands do not earn enough money to meet their basic needs. These individuals are walking a financial tightrope — they are barely able to get by, with no ability to save for college, a home, or for retirement. United Way of the Midlands focuses on financial stability to help lower-income individuals and families increase and maximize their income in order to meet daily expenses, as well as to begin the longer-term process of saving and building assets.The Work We're Doing
contributor dollars, United Way holds agencies accountable for the programs they run, only funding programs with good results. Grants are typically awarded for a period of three years, with continued funding dependent on satisfactory outcome reports. Click on one of the following links to view United Way of the Midlands' Community Investments in Income:Why Focus on Income?
Financial stability is the foundation for healthy families and communities. A variety of factors prevent some people in our community from fully realizing their potential with consequences for them and for the community. For example, low literacy is linked to poverty and unemployment and creates obstacles to individual success. The lifetime cost to the public (lost taxes, increased Medicaid and increased incarceration expenses) of one year's class of dropouts in South Carolina is estimated to be $4.9 billion. Housing costs that are out of reach to low-wage workers also diminish opportunity. The housing wage for the Columbia area (hourly earnings necessary to pay for a two-bedroom apartment at the fair market rent) is $12.15 per hour. This means that an individual earning the minimum wage would have to work more than two full-time jobs to afford housing. The high rate of foreclosure in S.C. also threatens the housing security of homeowners. Richland County currently reports 200 foreclosure filings per month.
