How much do I need to make to live in Poughkeepsie?

HOW TO SURVIVE IN POUGHKEEPSIE, NY

New York State is widely recognized for having some of the highest taxes in the entire country. In fact, the Basic Family Budget Calculator shows that the estimated minimum budget for living in the Town of Poughkeepsie and the surrounding area is over $17,000 more than the estimated minimum budget of a place like Charleston, SC. Some places in Dutchess County are nicer than others, and many of the tiny villages in the area are home to multimillionaires. However, I decided to look at one of the biggest towns in Dutchess County, the Town of Poughkeepsie.
Poughkeepsie is a very blue collar town, and many of the residents live just barely above, at, or below the poverty level. Because of its excessive violence, crime, and illegal substance abuse, Poughkeepsie has affectionately earned the nickname of “the ghetto” to its inhabitants and residents of the surrounding region. The schools are well-known as some of the worst and most overcrowded in the county, although they have some phenomenal sports teams. The current mayor John C. Tkazyik has been working on transitioning the Town and as a result, many neighborhoods are becoming more habitable, the crime rate has been declining, and the standard of living has been going up.
For this blog, I decided to be very specific, and actually assumed the role of the head of a four person household, interested in residing in Poughkeepsie. I looked into housing, health insurance, food costs, transportation costs, and child care, among other things. I totaled up the sums of all of the above to give me the minimum cost of living in Poughkeepsie on both a monthly and annual basis. I have broken it down by category, some of which come from the EPI Family Budget Guide, others that I have made up myself.

Housing: $1,200/month = 14,400/year
Housing was probably the most straightforward category. Assuming the role of a prospective renter, I scoured the internet for the perfect house to raise my two dependents. Among the things that I considered to be important were cost, size, and proximity to schools/places of business. I eventually found a decent house on craigslist.com. It’s a 3-bedroom duplex, and we would be inhabiting the upper floor. The house is right on the main street in Poughkeepsie, creatively named Main Street. It is very close to both of the grocery stores, the train station, and Poughkeepsie Middle School. With water and sewage included, the total cost came to $1,200/month.
Pros:
-Proximity to school
-Water/sewage included
-It’s an actually house vs. an apartment
-City bus stops nearby
-Train station nearby
-Several different shops in walking distance
-Child care provider nearby
Cons:
-Questionable neighborhood
-Situated on busy intersection
-Heating/electric not included in overall price

Food: $672/month = $8,064/year
Given New York’s extremely high sales tax, food is more expensive in Poughkeepsie than it is elsewhere, in other aesthetically and economically similar cities in other states. One big problem with Poughkeepsie grocery stores is that they are small and individually owned, therefore the food is oftentimes more expensive. To calculate what the minimum food budget would be for a semi-nutritious diet, I went to http://www.cnpp.usda.gov/Publications/FoodPlans/2010/CostofFoodFeb10.pdf and typed in the Poughkeepsie zip code, 12601. I then averaged the lowest and the next to lowest average budgets to come up with my final number.
I then called up my mother, and had her do just a little research for me. I asked her some of the prices she pays for groceries at home, and did some calculations. The total cost of food that my family pays per month came out to be about 35% more than the government estimate, but I have a 21-year old brother living at home who is a former athlete and eats like one, as well as a 16-year old brother who eats roughly as much as the average race horse. I decided that the number that I found is an accurate one for a family of four with two small children.

Transportation: $482/month = $5,784/year
Transportation was the most complicated category that I had to decipher, given the specific combinations of public and private transportation that the average citizen of Poughkeepsie uses. In order to be fair, but realistic, I decided that my family would have only one car, given that we have only two drivers in our family. In addition, I researched the bus rates, which are $1.50/trip. The last thing, the most interesting factor of the transportation category would be the train usage. Many people in Poughkeepsie commute to NYC every single day, and I decided that either my spouse or I would travel down to the city once a week, bumping up our family budget to acquire four round trip train trips to Grand Central Station.
Most citizens in the Town of Poughkeepsie use the bus daily for travel, so I decided that if the four members of our family averaged a total of six bus trips per day, the total would be about $232/month or $2,784/year. This would include commuting to and from work for one of the working parents, plus travelling around the cities for basic needs such as groceries, or appointments.
I “googled” the average MPG of a regular, functional American car, and I found that it came out to be about 17 mpg. Since we live in a small city, the car wouldn’t get much more use than travelling to and from the train station, or driving down the street to get groceries, or pick the kids up from daycare. If the car was used roughly about 15 miles per day, that would be 100 miles per week. The cost of gas in Poughkeepsie is about $2.92 per gallon, which means that roughly $70 per month would be spent on fueling up the car.
Commuting to New York City once a week would be very expensive, but it is mandatory for many jobs, so I decided to include it. A round trip train ticket from Poughkeepsie to Grand Central Station is $40. If I commuted once a week, it would come out to be about $160/month or $1,920 per year.

Child care: $125/week = $500/month = $6,000/year
I searched for child care like I did for housing, scouring the corners of the Internet to find the best deal. On craigslist.com I found a woman whose children had left for college who wanted to be a full time nanny. She was very reasonably priced, so I decided that she might be more beneficial for my children than a daycare. She has her own transportation, so she’d be able to pick the kids up from school, drive them to her own home, which is in a much safer and nicer area than our home, and drop them off at a given time every weekday.
I did have to give this serious consideration, the daycare vs. nanny dilemma. In the end, I chose hiring an inexpensive nanny over sending my kids to the local child care service, Little Apples Daycare.
Pros:
-Less inexpensive
-One on one attention
-Safer neighborhood
Cons:
-Less socialization with peers
Healthcare: $362/month = $4,344/year
In order to figure out the appropriate price for healthcare for a family of four, I went online to get a free quote. It was as simple as pushing a button. I found Empire Healthcare, which allowed me to insure my entire family for as low as $362 per month. It’s not the most comprehensive plan on the market, but it is a solid plan that includes coverage in case of accidents or serious illnesses.

Taxes: $812/month = $9,744/year
Taxes were very tough to calculate based on the fact that I don’t know how much my alleged spouse or I make per year. To estimate this figure, I looked at the EPI budget estimate, then went to http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html. It’s true that the income tax in New York is much higher than many other states, but since I’m renting a home instead of owning one, I don’t have to pay a property tax or a school tax. Again my mother helped me come up with this figure.

Bills:
Electric: $2,000/year
This is the big one. Since we have a fairly small home, the electric bill won’t be overly large until the wintertime when the heating bills elevate everything. Since I would expect to pay about $125/month in electric bills during the fall, spring, and summer months, and $250/month during the four winter months (curse those cold upstate NY winters!)

Other:

Phones: $125/month = $1500
Instead of having a landline, I opted for two cell phones, one for each of the adults in the family. This eliminated the phone bill at the house and will keep our electric bill just slightly less. The plan does not include texting, and we only have a set number of minutes per month, which is fairly low.

Garbage Removal: $30/month = $360/year
In the Town of Poughkeepsie and the surrounding area, it costs money to have your garbage picked up every week.

Clothing: $1200/year = $100/month
My home is right down the street from the Salvation Army store and Goodwill, so the family doesn’t have to spend exorbitant amounts of money on clothing. The children will probably get around $250 of new clothes each in the fall for the upcoming school year, and the adults will probably spend about $350 each on clothes throughout the year.

School/work/home supplies: $402/year = $33/month
The kids will need new school supplies every year, and I’m guessing that my alleged spouse and I will like to keep some office supplies in the home, such as paper, paperclips, staplers, pens, and pencils just to name a few. The kids are going to need new notebooks, paper, folders, pens, pencils, art supplies, and backpacks just to name a few things. This also includes things like paper plates and plastic utensils or cups and dishwashing liquid/soap.

Car Maintenance: $100/month = $1,200/year
The average older car needs to be maintained often, and while it may not require $100 every month, it will probably require major fixings at least once or twice a year that can total up to $600 each session.
Car Insurance: $145/month = $1,736/year
Auto insurance is a requirement in order to be able to drive your car on the road. I went a website and looked up a quote for the car which my older brother and I share, a 1997 Ford Taurus station wagon.



A TABLE OF MY EXPENSES

Expense Cost per month Cost per year
Housing 1200 14400
Food 672 8064
Transportation 482 5784
Child Care 500 6000
Healthcare 362 4344
Taxes 812 9744
Electric Bill 125-250 2000
Phone 125 1500
OTHER
Garbage Removal 30 360
Clothing 100 1200
School/work/home supplies 33 402
Car Maintenance 100 1200
Auto Insurance 145 1736

On the website with the EPI Family Budget Calculator, the basic budget for a family of four was about $63,000. I only used $56,532, but I am not the head of a household. I have never had to support a family. I don’t know what expenses are hidden with that responsibility. I tried to think of everything that would cost a family money, with the exception of eating at restaurants, vacations, and other unnecessary factors, but I am sure that there are more expenses.
The total cost of living per month is $4,711. The total cost of living per year is $56,532. The national poverty line for 2009 for a family of four with 2 children under age 18 was $21,832. That’s a difference of 34,700. This is clearly unacceptable. I don’t understand how the government expects a family to be able to survive when even the most basic of budgets far exceed the national poverty level. In fact, this basic existence in Poughkeepsie, NY is 259% of the poverty level. I find it surprising that the government still calculates the poverty level based on how much a family spends on food, when the percentage of income that the family has to spend on food has gone down so much over the last 5 decades. I think it’s time for the government to come up with something new. Perhaps they should just take the bottom 15% of incomes and classify them as “below poverty”, or something as simple as that, because this system that we have in place currently is obviously not working.