WASHINGTON — The economy’s booming. Some states have raised minimum wages. But even with recent wage growth for the lowest-paid workers, there is still nowhere in the country where someone working a full-time minimum-wage job could afford to rent a modest two-bedroom apartment, according to an annual report released Wednesday by the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
Even in Arkansas, the state with the cheapest housing, one would need to earn $13.84 an hour, about $29,000 a year, to afford a two-bedroom apartment. The minimum wage in Arkansas is $8.50 an hour.
Even the $15 living wage championed by Democrats would not make a dent in most states.
In Hawaii, the state with the most expensive housing, one would have to make $36.13, about $75,000 a year. The minimum wage in Hawaii is $10.10 an hour.
It gets worse in many metropolitan areas. San Francisco, Marin, and San Mateo counties in California top the list of most-expensive jurisdictions, where one would need to make $60.02 an hour.
‘‘The housing crisis is growing, especially for the lowest-income workers,’’ said Diane Yentel, president of the National Low Income Housing Coalition. ‘‘The rents are far out of reach from what the average renter is earning.’’
Downsizing to a one-bedroom apartment will help only so much.
According to the report, a one-bedroom is affordable for minimum-wage workers in only 22 counties in five states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington. Those states all set their minimum wages higher than the federal minimum of $7.25.
Nationally, one would have to earn $17.90 an hour to afford a modest one-bedroom apartment or $22.10 an hour for a two-bedroom rental. That’s based on the common budgeting standard of spending a maximum of 30 percent of income on housing.
The report estimates renters nationally make an average of $16.88 an hour. That means even those making above minimum wage struggle to afford rent.
Housing costs have continued to rise with growing demand for rental housing in the decade since the Great Recession. At the same time, new rental construction has tilted toward the luxury market because of increasingly high development costs, the report said.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has tried cutting federal housing subsidies for the lowest-income Americans; only 1 in 4 households eligible for federal rent assistance get any help, the report said. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson recently proposed tripling rent for the poorest households.
