The Bay Area is a region of tremendous wealth and prosperity but many individuals and families struggle to maintain some semblance of economic security. There are many effective anti-poverty programs, such as:
Once these individuals and families are lifted above the federal poverty line and become ineligble for many social welfare programs they continue to stuggle to meet basic needs. The level at which a household is considered to be in poverty is quite low. In fact in 2016 a single person making $11,880 or a household with two workers and two kids making $24,300 would not be considered to be in poverty (McGovern, Connor F. "Good News, Everybody!" Jacobin, 10 Oct. 2016).
So for example, a single worker with a gross monthly income over $1287 ($15,444/yr) AND a net montly income above $990 ($11,880/yr) would be ineligible for SNAP/CalFresh benefits. As you can see from this example we have someone that makes "too much" to be eligible for social welfare benefits but is very much struggling to have what amounts to economic security. Absent a more robust and generous welfare state basic economic security will have to come from increased market income. Groups like Fight For Fifteen have been instrumental in pushing this conversation and enacting real change for workers living in precarity.
There are limits to solely depending on market income to bring about economic security for all individuals and families though. This can be seen quite clearly when we switch to the 'Single Worker, With Infant' family type and notice that a worker in this family type would have to be earning an hourly wage of anywhere between $26.20 - $33.43 an hour. Given the retrenchment of union power and lack of collective bargaining for many workers, getting to this sort of wage level may be a tough climb. A universal child allowance would go a long way to giving workers with children greater economic security while they fight for a living wage and a union.
This map shows what it would take for a variety of family types to be able to live in the nine Bay Area counties and maintain a basic level of economic security. Select a family type and then mouse over a particular county of interest. A popup will appear with a budget of what the family type of interest would need to be economically secure in a particular county.
Bay Area county boundary data comes from SF OpenData. Economic security data for the Bay Area comes from the Basic Economic Security Tables Index which was created collaboratively by Wider Opportunities for Women and the Center for Social Development at Washington University-St. Louis. Currently, the BEST data sets are maintained by the Institute for Women's Policy Research. For a breakdown of the expenses outlined in the BEST data refer to this section of the BEST website. The BEST methodology and supplemental data is available here.