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I work for the Northwest Side Community Development Corporation, in Milwaukee, and am immersed in data about unemployment, poverty, and disinvestment.
Here are some compelling “factoids” that, when connected, offer some perspective about the obstacles, and our accomplishments.
In 2007, there were 488 businesses in the 53216 zip code (where our office is located at the northern tip of the once-booming 30th Street Industrial Corridor). Just 22 businesses were classified as “Manufacturing” and only THREE employed more than 20 workers. There are 23 businesses classified as “Professional Technical,” however only four have more than 20 workers.
There are, however, 162 “Health Care and Social Assistance” businesses (mostly day-cares) and 73 “Retail Trade” businesses, and those are the two largest employer classifications. And are lower-paying, typically.
Wal-Mart is one of the two largest employers in the 53216 area code, and the largest employer in the State of Wisconsin. Nationally, Wal-Mart reports a full-time wage as $9.68 per hour; however watchdog groups estimate the figure at $8.28 per hour. Wal-Mart also freely admits that it classifies a 34 hour work week as “full time,” so even at $9.68 per hour, the annual wage is $17,114.24.
You could live on that as a single person; a family could not. Wal-Mart also is famous in Wisconsin for having the highest number of working-poor employees on state assistance for health care benefits.
The good news is that the other of the two largest employers in 53216 is DRS Power & Control Technologies, a manufacturer of power controls for the US Navy, with which the NWSCDC has a long, collaborative history.
Recently, with the help of the NWSCDC, DRS trained and hired about 20 assembly workers through the Milwaukee Workforce Investment Board. These new DRS workers are now in a union and have wages averaging nearly double those at Wal-Mart. The new DRS workers get health care benefits and yes, work a full 40 hour week.
We are making progress, and are glad to have the support of DRS. They’re a great example of industry, government, and a community based non-profit working together to spark economic development and create jobs where they are needed most.
-Sam McGovern-Rowen
Director of Business Development
Northwest Side Community Development Corporation
