Produced by:

Dr. Noreen Channels, Professor Emeritus/TCN Research Coordinator
Dr. Beth Notar, Assistant Professor of Anthropology
The Students of Economic Anthropology

Trinity College $ 300 Summit Street $ Hartford, Connecticut 06106-3100

Requests for research are submitted by members of local community organizations to the Trinity Center for Neighborhoods. A Research Coordinating Team reviews the requests and selects researchers from a pool of faculty and community-based research organizations. The community organizations incorporate the research results into their neighborhood revitalization strategies.

The work that provided the basis for this publication was supported by funding under an award with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The substance and findings of the work are dedicated to the public. The author is solely responsible for the accuracy of the statements and interpretations contained in this publication. Such interpretations do not necessarily reflect the views of the government, Trinity College, or the Trinity Center for Neighborhoods.

ABSTRACT

The Self-Sufficiency Standard offers a clear picture of a family's basic needs by calculating the cost of living in a particular geographical area for families of various composition and size. While the original Self-Sufficiency Study calculated other living costs by location, it used national, USDA food prices for this item in a family=s budget, claiming that food prices do not vary significantly across the nation. The validity of using national food costs to estimate Hartford expenses was the primary question addressed in this study.

In this research, we have priced food in over 45 Hartford groceries to determine the actual cost of food for Hartford families. Our work shows that the national food cost estimates determined by the USDA are 18.79% lower than the actual cost of food in Hartford, averaged across the 70 family types.

Adjusting the Self-Sufficiency Standard by the specific percentages by which Hartford food costs are higher than the USDA estimates for each family type shows that families must actually earn from $0.17 to $0.56 more an hour than was suggested by the Self-Sufficiency Standard.

These data show that calculation of the Self-Sufficiency wages required by Hartford families must take into account the considerably higher food costs that residents must pay.

Special thanks to Dr. Beth Notar and the students in her Economic Anthropology class (Anthropology 238) at Trinity College for their research and analysis efforts in preparing this supplement to the self-sufficiency study.

Economic Anthropology - Spring 2002

Nathaniel Amory

Ryan Beale

David Bigley

Jason Burns

Michelle Canero

Thomas Devine

Jeff Dunn

Lori Evans

Geoffrey Faulkner

Brian Fenwick

Andrew Halder

Allison Havourd

Laura Holman

Nneka Lundy

Roy Ostrom

Ramsey Ramadan

Steve Reydel

Sean Rohan

Meghan Roscio

Morgan Scott

Kabir Shah

Eric Shattenkirk

Shapley Stauffer

Kyle Stevens

Courtney Stewart

Steven Sideris

Kristen Walsh

Brian Westwater

Trevor Wood

John Ziadie

The Self-Sufficiency Standard is a precise calculation that determines how much income is needed for a family to adequately meet its basic needs in today=s economy B without public or private assistance.

The Self-Sufficiency Standard offers a clear picture of a family's basic needs by calculating the cost of living in a particular geographical area for families of various composition and size. These data for the Hartford region have provided us with an opportunity to determine the actual cost of living for 70 different types of families.

For example, the study=s 1998 data show that in the Hartford region an adult with a preschooler and a school-age child needed to earn $2,766 a month, or $15.72 an hour, for self-sufficiency as defined in this study. In a family of four with two working adults and three children -- an infant, a preschooler, and a school-aged child-- both adults needed to work full-time at a wage of $12.50 an hour in order for the family to be self-sufficient. (The minimum wage at the time of the study was $5.18.)

The Self-Sufficiency Standard is a more useful means of determining wage adequacy than the Federal Poverty Measure because it incorporates regional and local variations in costs; it considers the age as well as the number of children in the family -- and the associated costs of food and child care; it assumes that all adults work full-time and therefore must be able to support their transportation and child care; and it includes the effects of taxes and tax credits. A further advantage of the Self-Sufficiency Standard is that it estimates the separate costs of living expenses (e.g., the cost of housing, child-care, transportation, health care ), whereas the poverty standard is an estimate based on the costs of food alone and on fixed ratios between expenses.

However, while the original Self-Sufficiency Study calculated other living costs by location, it used national, USDA food prices for this item in a family=s budget, claiming that food prices do not vary significantly across the nation. The validity of using national food costs to estimate Hartford expenses was the primary question addressed in this study.

METHODOLOGY

In the spring of 2002, the Trinity Center for Neighborhoods and Assistant Professor Beth Notar=s Economic Anthropology class undertook a project to determine the current food costs in the City of Hartford.

In this project, students visited over 45 grocery stores of varying sizes in Hartford, noting prices for foods selected from each food category (e.g. fruits and vegetables, grain products) of the USDA=s low-cost menu. Following the approach of the Self-Sufficiency Standard, we used the USDA nutritional requirements for males and females of various ages to estimate the local food prices in Hartford for the 70 types of families. (The sources of USDA information and further details of the methodology are included in an appendix to this report.)

Having established the actual (average) food costs in Hartford, we examined the adequacy of using national food costs to estimate Hartford expenses. First, we compared our local food prices to the estimates of food costs used by the USDA for the same month, February 2002. This allowed us to determine whether the USDA is correct in its estimate of the food costs for families in Hartford. Second, to see the impact that these food cost differences have on a family=s self-sufficiency efforts, we adjusted the 1998 Self-Sufficiency Standard data by increasing the food costs by the percentage found in our pricing/USDA comparison. This allowed us to determine with more accuracy the wages necessary for Hartford families to attain self-sufficiency.

FINDINGS

USDA VS. HARTFORD FOOD COSTS:

Our work shows that the national food cost estimates determined by the USDA are considerably lower than the actual cost of food in Hartford. The research showed that food costs for families in Hartford average $95 month or 18.79% higher than the USDA estimate for the same time period, February, 2002. Hartford food costs range across the 70 family types from 16.36% to 21.71% higher than the USDA estimate.

For example, the 2002 data indicate that an adult with a preschooler and a school-age child must pay $75 more a month to cover food costs in Hartford than the USDA data indicate. A family with two adults, an infant, preschooler, and school-aged child must earn $113 more a month to cover food costs in Hartford.

These data, comparing current USDA food costs and Hartford food costs for 70 family types are presented in Table One in the appendix of this report.

Self-Sufficiency Standard Cost of Living, Original (using USDA estimates) and Adjusted (with Hartford food costs), 1998 data, for Two Family Types.

	One Adult, preschooler, school-aged child			Two adult wage earners, infant, preschooler, and school-aged child

	Original		Adjusted	Original		Adjusted

Housing	684		684	858		858
Child Care	848		848	1428		1428
Food	365	+18.66%=	433	553	+19.01%=	658
Transportation	143		143	281		281
Health Care	167		167	266		266
Miscellaneous	221		221	339		339
Taxes	485		485	857		857
Earned Inc. Tax Credit (-)	0		0	0		0
Child Care Tax Credit (-)	-80		-80	-80		-80
Child Tax Credit (-)	-67		-67	-100		-100

Monthly living expenses	2766		2834	4401		4507

Hourly wage necessary	$15.72		$16.10	$12.50 each adult		$12.80

The complete comparison of wage rates of the original 1998 Self-Sufficiency Standard with those adjusted to reflect food costs in Hartford, for 70 family types, is presented in Table Two in the appendix of this report. Adjusting the Self-Sufficiency Standard by the specific percentages by which Hartford food costs are higher than the USDA estimates for each family type shows that families must actually earn from $0.17 to $0.56 more an hour than was suggested by the Self-Sufficiency Standard.

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

For more information about this project and the research methodology, contact Alta Lash at the Trinity Center for Neighborhoods, Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut: (860) 297-5178 or Alta.Lash@trincoll.edu

The full 1999 report and self‑sufficiency figures for all regions of the state are available at www.sixstrategies.org. The report provides details about how each living expense is calculated, comparisons with other benchmarks of income, and strategies for closing the gap between actual incomes and the Self‑Sufficiency Standard. The national organization, Wider Opportunities for Women, has been involved in similar studies in over twenty other states. This information is also available at the six-strategics web site.

The Connecticut liaison to national self‑sufficiency efforts is the Connecticut Permanent Commission on the Status of Women. http://www.cga.state.ct.us/pcsw

Information about the low-cost food plan used in this food cost assessment, and in the Self-sufficiency Standard, is available from the USDA Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion. http://www.usda.gov/cnpp/FoodPlans

TABLE ONE: HARTFORD FOOD COSTS COMPARED TO USDA FOOD COSTS, FEBRUARY 2002
FOR 70 FAMILY TYPES, DOLLAR AND PERCENTAGE DIFFERENCES


	Average across all 70 family types	One Adult	One adult/one child:
			infant	preschool	schoolage	teen

MONTHLY EXPENSES:
Food Costs in Hartford, February 2002		$214	$314	$328	$372	$397
USDA estimated food costs, February 2002		$180	$262	$272	$317	$337
Amount by which USDA underestimates Hartford food costs	$95

Produced by:

Dr. Noreen Channels, Professor Emeritus/TCN Research Coordinator Dr. Beth Notar, Assistant Professor of Anthropology The Students of Economic Anthropology

Dr. Noreen Channels, Professor Emeritus/TCN Research Coordinator
Dr. Beth Notar, Assistant Professor of Anthropology
The Students of Economic Anthropology