Leader Staff
The income gap between the wealthiest and poorest residents in Menominee County is the largest in the state, according to the County Health Rankings released last week.
The rankings, compiled annually by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Health Institute, also showed Menominee County was the least healthiest in the state, ranking 72nd for the sixth consecutive year.
This was the first time since 2010 that the rankings included an income inequality statistic.
“This measure looks at income distribution or relative disadvantage in a county,” the County Health Rankings website explained.
Utilizing wage surveys from 2009 to 2013, the group compared the 20th percentile of household income to the 80th percentile to find a ratio of how much higher income families were making compared with lower income ones.
In Menominee County, 20 percent of households were making $13,560 or less (lowest 20th percentile household income in the state) while the top 80 percent were making $71,389 or more (second lowest 80th percent household income in the state).
That meant the 80th percentile of households makes 5.5 times more than the 20th percentile, as compared to a state average income inequality ratio of 4.3.
The income ratio in Milwaukee County, the county with the second largest gap, was 5.0, with a $17,600 income level for the 20th percentile and $87,200 for the 80th percentile.
Income inequality counted for 2.5 percent of a county’s overall score for health factors, which also took into account rates for smoking, obesity, drinking, medical care availability, education and other statistics related to health.
The County Health Rankings website said the disparity statistic is worth looking at, however, because researchers “identified at least modest relationships between income inequality and health at all levels.”
According to the latest U.S. Census information, 31 percent of Menominee County residents live below the poverty line.
“From my perspective, poverty has an impact on health,” said Jerry Waukau, health administrator at the Menominee Tribal Clinic. “For those people who face the disparity, their health has also struggled.”
About 4,000 of the 4,200 county residents are Menominee tribal members, Waukau noted.
Waukau said addressing the county’s health issues will require a collaborative effort among multiple local, state and federal agencies.
“If we are going to combat it, we have to combat it a lot of different ways by improving the community and improving the jobs,” Waukau said. “Health is one component of it. We have to look at it from a big picture standpoint.
“We can’t do this on our own, so we need other partners to take part in our journey. We need the schools, we need the (College of Menominee Nation), we need the county. We need all of these levels to be on the same page.”
Local residents also must do their part.
“It is self-management, trying to get diabetics to come in and take ownership into their diabetic care,” Waukau said. “We want to create empowerment among our people to get to their appointments. … People not getting to their appointments makes it difficult to manage their care.”
While noting that the county and tribe have made improvements in some of the areas since the health rankings started — graduation rates, for example, increased from 68 percent in 2010 to 93 percent this year — Waukau said some issues can take years to overcome.
“We are running a marathon. We can’t sprint in this effort,” he said.