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Joint Fiscal Office reviews Basic Needs Report and new livable‑wage method
Summary
The Joint Fiscal Office briefed the Ways & Means Committee on the Basic Needs Report, explaining statutory categories, recent methodological changes and the new household basis for the official livable wage.
Pat Titterton, Joint Fiscal Office staff, briefed the Ways & Means Committee on the office’s 2024 Basic Needs Report and recent methodological and statutory changes to the state’s livable‑wage calculation.
Titterton told the committee the Basic Needs Report is a biennial, statutory required calculation that sums costs for essentials defined in statute—“food, housing, transportation, childcare, utilities, health and dental care, taxes, rental and life insurance, personal expenses and savings”—and estimates an hourly wage needed to cover those costs without public assistance.
The report includes some spending categories not explicitly listed in statute. “Clothing, telecommunications and, new for this report, personal care products” are treated as basic needs, Titterton said, and were added after technical advisory and Joint Fiscal Committee review. He said the report is intended as a reference point, not a legal mandate or a minimum‑wage setting tool.
Titterton described a set of seven household…
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