(C) Minnesota Reformer
This story was originally published by Minnesota Reformer and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .
The Topline: Paycheck to paycheck • Minnesota Reformer [1]
['Christopher Ingraham', 'More From Author', '- March', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Avatar', 'Where Img', 'Height Auto Max-Width']
Date: 2025-03-24
Welcome to The Topline, a weekly roundup of the big numbers driving the Minnesota news cycle, as well as the smaller ones that you might have missed. This week: Minnesotans think success is harder to come by for some groups; the loneliest states; measuring paycheck-to-paycheck living; and calculating when you will die.
Playing the game of life on hard mode
Around 40% of Minnesotans say that being Black, Indigenous or Hispanic makes it harder to be successful in life. Just 19% believe that being Asian makes success more difficult. And somehow, despite all evidence to the contrary, 6% of Minnesotans say being white makes it harder to get by.
Those numbers come from an APM Research Lab survey conducted late last fall. They also show that 41% of respondents say it’s harder being a woman, while 7% say being a man is an impediment to success. In fact, 13% of Minnesota men say it’s actually easier to be a woman. Just 5% of women agree with them.
Republicans stand out for their general skepticism of the notion that life is harder for certain demographic groups. Only about 20% say that Black, Hispanic and Indigenous people face barriers to success due to their ethnicity. On the flip side Republicans are more likely to say that white people have it bad, with 10% endorsing that view.
The loneliest states
Last week the Washington Post’s Department of Data dug into a 2024 Census survey asking respondents how often they felt lonely. The data show that places in the deep South — Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi — have the highest levels of self-reported loneliness, while states in New England and the northern plains generally have lower rates of loneliness.
States with low levels of loneliness “tend to have the highest rates of volunteering and organizational membership,” the Post’s Andrew Van Dam notes.
It’s worth noting that the differences between states aren’t huge — just a handful of percentage points separate the top and bottom states in each category. But because the survey captured responses from more than half a million people, those differences are meaningful.
Interestingly, loneliness was negatively correlated with age: Younger people are more likely to report frequent feelings of loneliness. So are those who are less educated, and those who make less money. “The more you earn, the less alone you feel,” Van Dam writes.
Another unexpected correlation: People who always work in the office are slightly more likely to be lonely than those with either hybrid or remote working schedules, although that difference may ultimately be a function of income more than anything else.
Paycheck to paycheck
There’s an ongoing debate in Democratic policy circles over how many people actually live “paycheck to paycheck.” Some surveys show, for instance, that more than half of Americans report not having any money left over after paying for essentials like housing and food.
Progressive politicians like Sen. Bernie Sanders frequently cite this figure in policy discussions, drawing the ire of more centrist-minded folks who point out that other, more reliable surveys show that more than half of Americans say they have cash savings sufficient to cover three months of expenses, or that in 2022 the typical American household had close to $7,850 in liquid assets.
Progressive lawyer Matt Bruenig of the People’s Policy Project recently attempted to reconcile these differences, starting with the observation that “paycheck to paycheck” isn’t a very well-defined term to begin with. He argues that $7,850 isn’t actually a whole lot of money considering that the median annual household income is around $70,000.
“This means that median liquid savings is only 40 days of median income,” he writes. “If you would run out of liquid savings in 40 days, do you not live paycheck to paycheck? How few days does it need to be? 30 days? 20 days?”
If you exclude the elderly, the majority of whom are presumably retired and not bringing home a paycheck, the number drops down to 31 days.
The whole piece makes for an informative read.
The days of our lives
Nathan Yau of Flowing Data has a fun interactive piece on his website that runs real-time simulations of your remaining life expectancy while you read through the story. The simulations use cohort-based life expectancy measures from Social Security, which estimate how much time you have remaining based on your current age, rather than the more familiar life expectancy at birth calculation.
The current life expectancy in the United States, for instance, is around 78 years. I’m 45, and because I’ve managed to avoid many of the things that kill younger people, like gun violence or drug overdose, the typical person in my position can expect to live to around 83. But as the interactive vividly illustrates, that’s not guaranteed (I know from experience).
“Catastrophe might strike tomorrow,” Yau writes. “You might die at 120 years old and live in the record books for all time. Most likely, reality falls somewhere in between.”
[END]
---
[1] Url:
https://minnesotareformer.com/2025/03/24/the-topline-paycheck-to-paycheck/
Published and (C) by Minnesota Reformer
Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons License CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/MnReformer/
