“I have chosen not to have children at this time largely due to my concerns about access to and affordability of child care.”
— Brown County child care survey respondent
This is one person’s experience. But it gives us a glimpse into something much bigger happening in our community.
Families across Brown County are working, raising young people and making decisions about what they can and cannot afford every day.
New ALICE® data is helping us see just how different those realities can be, even within the same county.
ALICE stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. These are households earning above the Federal Poverty Level, but not enough to afford the basic cost of living where they live.
When we looked at the data for some of Brown County’s youngest children, one difference was hard to ignore.
GREEN BAY CITY AREA
90%
of infants and toddlers ages 0–2 lived in households below the ALICE Threshold.
OUTER GREEN BAY
11%
of infants and toddlers ages 0–2 lived in households below the ALICE Threshold.
Source: 2022 American Community Survey data
These young people are growing up in the same Brown County community. But their families may be experiencing very different financial realities.
For us, that raises an important question: Why?
The Data Gives Us a Place to Start
A number like 90% can get our attention. But it can’t tell us everything.
It doesn’t tell us what one family needs. It doesn’t tell us why this difference exists. And it doesn’t tell us what a young person’s future will look like. What it can do is help us see where we need to look closer and listen more.
When we zoom out, we see that financial hardship is not a small part of Brown County’s story.
In 2024, 35% of Brown County households, roughly 38,400 households, could not afford the basic cost of living. That’s more than 1 in every 3 households.
That number might feel surprising when we consider that Brown County’s median household income is $80,463, higher than Wisconsin’s median. That’s part of what ALICE helps us understand. A family can be working and still be struggling.
A household can look financially stable on paper and still be making difficult choices about child care, housing, groceries and transportation. And sometimes those choices change the direction of a family’s life.
One parent who responded to our Brown County child care survey told us:
“I quit my job of 9+ years to stay home due to cost.”
That’s more than a data point. That’s a career. A family’s income. A decision that likely wasn’t simple.
What Does It Actually Cost to Get By?
In 2024, the Federal Poverty Level was $15,060 for a single adult. In Brown County, that same single adult needed an estimated $30,024 a year just to cover basic expenses.
For two adults with an infant and a preschooler in child care, the estimated cost of those basics climbed to $93,636 a year.
That space between what we traditionally define as poverty and what it actually costs to get by is where many ALICE families live.
They are working. They are contributing to our community. They are raising families.
And they may still be one unexpected expense, child care bill or change in circumstances away from having to make a very difficult choice.
What About Our Youngest Learners?
This is where we come back to the young people at the beginning of this story.
Among 3- and 4-year-olds living below the ALICE Threshold, approximately 26% in the Green Bay City area were enrolled in preschool. In Outer Green Bay, that number was 57%.
Again, the difference makes us curious.
Is it affordability?
Is it access to child care or preschool?
Transportation?
Available programs?
Family choice?
Or is there something else we haven’t heard yet?
The data doesn’t give us that answer. And we don’t want to assume it does.
That’s Where Listening Comes In
At Achieve Brown County, our role isn’t to look at a number like 90% and decide we know the story. Our role is to help our community see the data, bring people together around it and ask what we need to understand next.
Behind every percentage are real families.
Families making decisions about work.
Families figuring out child care.
Families trying to make rent, groceries and everything else fit into the same monthly budget.
Families who also know their own communities, their strengths and what would make a difference in their lives.
The numbers help us see where experiences are different. People help us understand why. That’s the work that comes next.
Listening to families. Learning alongside our partners. Looking at what resources already exist and where gaps remain. Then using what we learn together to determine where our community can act.
Because where a young person grows up shouldn’t determine the opportunities available to them.
If the data is showing us that young people within the same county may be starting from very different places, we owe it to them to understand why.
Explore the Data
Want to understand what the basic cost of living looks like for different households?
Use the ALICE Income Status Tool to explore how income, household size, location and basic living costs affect financial stability.
About the Data
The Wisconsin ALICE Report is commissioned by United Way of Wisconsin with support from local United Ways, including Brown County United Way, and additional investors.
Data Responsibility: No single dataset can fully capture every individual or community experience. This information is intended to support understanding, thoughtful decision-making and meaningful community conversations. It should be interpreted within its broader context and should not be used to stereotype, stigmatize or make assumptions about individuals or groups.
Data Acknowledgment: We thank United For ALICE and Brown County United Way for their partnership, data review and guidance for this blog.
Sources
- United For ALICE. (2026). The State of ALICE in Wisconsin. Data for 2024: ALICE in Brown County. https://www.unitedforalice.org/wisconsin
- United For ALICE. (2026). The State of ALICE in Wisconsin. Data for 2024: Household survival budget: https://www.unitedforalice.org/county-reports/wisconsin
- United For ALICE. (2026). ALICE County Reports with ZIP and Place Data: Brown County, Wisconsin. Data for 2024. https://www.UnitedForALICE.org/county-reports/wisconsin.
- United For ALICE. ALICE Income Status Tool. Data for 2024.
https://www.UnitedForALICE.org/alice-income-status-tool - Brown County United Way. (2026). Financial Hardship in Brown County. Two-page fact sheet using 2024 data from The State of ALICE in Wisconsin. View the report.
- U.S. Census Bureau. (2024). American Community Survey, 2024 estimates: Brown County, Wisconsin.
- U.S. Census Bureau. (2024). TIGER/Line Shapefiles: Wisconsin County Subdivisions
- United For ALICE. (2024). ALICE in Focus: Children. Estimates are based on the 2022 American Community Survey Public Use Microdata Sample. Green Bay City and Outer Green Bay represent Public Use Microdata Areas (PUMAs), statistical geographic areas defined by the U.S. Census Bureau with populations of at least 100,000. Explore the ALICE in Focus on Children map and methodology.