Survey of Low-Wage Workers

This survey by The Washington Post, the Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University provides a detailed look at the real life experiences and views of low-wage workers and assesses their financial challenges, including difficulties obtaining and paying for health care, their views about their financial and job situations and their hopes and expectations for the future.

The Survey of Low-Wage Workers is the 17th in a series generated under this three-way partnership. The partners worked together to pick the survey topics, design the survey instruments, and analyze the results. This telephone poll was conducted from June 18 to July 7, 2008 among 1,350 randomly selected low-wage workers nationwide.

The project team included Jon Cohen, The Washington Post director of polling and Jennifer Agiesta, polling analyst; Drew E. Altman, president of the Kaiser Family Foundation, Mollyann Brodie, vice president and director of public opinion and survey research, Elizabeth Hamel and Claudia Deane, associate directors, Carolina Gutiérrez, survey analyst, and Sasha Buscho, research assistant; and Robert J. Blendon, professor of health policy and political analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health and the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and John M. Benson, managing director of the Harvard Opinion Research Program in the Harvard School of Public Health.

The Washington Post articles:
Hovering Above Poverty, Grasping for Middle Class
Obama Leads, Pessimism Reigns Among Key Group
Clinging to Dreams of a Better Life
Life’s Basics More of a Stretch

Survey Brief (.pdf)

Toplines (.pdf)