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New Census data finds that KY household incomes fell over the last 5 years.
The Census just released data today that shines the light on a grim reality: Kentucky households are earning less and less. The data show that median household income was $2427 *less* in 2010 than it was in 2006, and that almost one-third of Kentucky families earn less than $25,000 a year.
The Kentucky Center for Economic Policy released a statement on the report with a quote from Jason Bailey, the director of KCEP. We suspect it will resonate with so many Kentuckians who are out of work, and so many Kentuckians who are dealing with traffic jams in Louisville, or thinking twice about driving across that bridge to Cincinnati:
“The news in Kentucky highlights a big disconnect: a crumbling bridge and other inadequate infrastructure in the neighborhood of construction workers in need of a job,” said Bailey. “There is work to be done and people willing to do it. We are missing the public action needed to make that work happen.”
The data also highlights how racial disparities in wealth are impacting Kentuckians: In 2010, Kentucky's poverty rate was 19%. Among African Americans in Kentucky the poverty rate was 33.6%, and among Latinos it was 33.4%.
To read KCEP's statement go here.
(Meanwhile, Senator Paul got it very wrong when he said in a hearing, "The rich are getting richer, but the poor are getting richer even faster. That's clearly not true. From a CBPP report about census data released last week: "the poverty rate in
2010 reached its second-highest point since 1965, median income
declined, and the number and percentage of Americans without health
insurance stood at record highs. The
share of Americans in "deep poverty" — with incomes below half of the poverty line — also hit the highest level on record, with data going back to 1975.")
KY Household income
why not?
You (or your friend, up there) write that bit about building a new energy economy as if you don't really believe it. Why not?
This time last year, a group of American small business associations released a report showing that 1.9 million jobs have been lost in the US due to Congress's *inaction* on clean energy legislation. How many of those jobs could have been worked by Kentuckians, if we'd had the leadership to make way for them? How many of them could have been worked by the miners who've lost jobs to machinery? There's no good reason that we can't build an economy out of making energy that's clean and affordable.
Right here in Kentucky, if we invested in energy efficiency, solar, hydropower and wind, we could meet the needs of Kentucky’s rural electric customers, while also creating nearly 9,000 jobs over 3 years. The Ochs Center said that, I bet you can google "Ochs Center" and KFTC and find the report.
We all want good jobs here in Kentucky. Hasn't Central Appalachia lost 62 percent of our coal jobs since the 1970s as the industry replaced miners with machines? And the industry has known for a long time that it's transitioning away from Central Appalachian coal, according to the Alpha CEO, and looking west for future coal reserves. Kentucky can't build a future on coal.
I want jobs for my friends and family just as much as you want them for yours. And I want water that I know is safe, and clean air. You said something about all those "lost jobs" being worth it if it saves one life. I don't believe we have to make that choice, not at all. Not for ourselves, and not for our kids. But we've got to take the reins, make a plan to transition, and choose what we *do* want next.
Shut down coal
please, keep it real.
Because the tone and "voice" of these responses is both so consistent among these posts, and so inconsistent with what we hear from our allies and members--the people who are working for a future for Kentucky families that includes both good jobs and safe water--we checked the IP address associated with these posts.
It's clear that the posts from "waterkeeper," "waterboy," and "sierra" all came from Frankfort IP addresses, and that one if them came from a computer using the state government's IP address.
What seems to be happening here, then, is that a public servant is using their time to pose as an ally of a citizen's group to spread nonsense about our work. Is this the best use of your time?
If you want to be transparent about who you are and the discussion that you want to have, you are welcome to post, and I'm sure people would love to engage with you. But if you continue to assume a false identity to try to spread untruths about our work, we will delete your posts.
(And if this what's going on, it's pretty sad that a public servant, paid through our tax dollars, sees online charades as the best use of their time.)
KY Household income