The new federal poverty guidelines, which were recently adjusted for inflation, are worth examining because they help illustrate the challenges faced by low-income working families. They show, for example, that single parents with one child are currently ineligible for BadgerCare if they have a full-time job that pays more than $7.91 per hour!

The federal poverty guidelines are updated early each year, and the 2018 guidelines that were issued in mid-January increased the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) by one to two percent for most family sizes. The adjustments for inflation slightly increase eligibility for many federal benefit programs, such as Medicaid, FoodShare and child care subsidies. An updated table on the Wisconsin Budget Project website shows what the poverty level is for different family sizes and how that affects eligibility for different public benefits. It also translates the annual poverty level figures into monthly and hourly incomes.

The positive thing about the new guidelines is that the small inflation adjustment expands eligibility to include a small number of people who had a tiny bit too much income to qualify for benefits in December. But that’s only true if they didn’t get a raise this year greater than the modest increase in the poverty guidelines. For a family of three, the poverty level is now $20,780, which is $360 more than last year, an adjustment of 1.8%.

Examining the table on the Wisconsin Budget Project website helps show why many low-income adults in Wisconsin are still uninsured—despite the substantial progress made in 2014 and 2015 in reducing our state’s uninsured population. It also helps illustrate why far more will become uninsured if the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is changed in ways that increase costs for low-wage workers.

Here are a few interesting and troublesome implications of how the 2018 poverty levels relate to BadgerCare eligibility:

• For a single parent with one child, the BadgerCare income limit amounts to $7.91 per hour (assuming a 40-hour work week). In other words, an adult in a two-person family will be ineligible for BadgerCare if they make just 70 cents per hour more than the minimum wage.
• For single childless adults, the BadgerCare income ceiling is $1,012 per month, which is equivalent to working 32 hours per week at the minimum wage. If they have a full-time minimum wage job they will have to seek subsidized private coverage through the federal Marketplace, but the higher cost-sharing in those plans puts that out of reach for many low-income people.
• In states that used the ACA to expand Medicaid eligibility for adults to 138% of FPL, the income limit amounts to $8.05 per hour for a childless adult and $10.92 for a single parent with one child.
• In Wisconsin, which cut in half the BadgerCare income eligibility limit for adults in 2014, if President Trump finally succeeds in killing the federal insurance Marketplace created by the ACA, a single mother with one child wouldn’t have access to affordable insurance if she makes more than $7.91 per hour.

Our website has an infographic that contains the new federal poverty levels and shows how they relate to different categories of eligibility for BadgerCare and subsidized coverage in the federal health insurance Marketplace.

As the debate about repealing the ACA resumes, think about the financial challenges facing a single parent in Wisconsin who has one child and is making a little more than $7.91. Try to imagine how you would cover rent, utilities, food, clothing, transportation and other expenses for your family, and then pay health insurance premiums and deductibles on top of all those other household costs.

Jon Peacock