Paying AmeriCorps Members More Could Increase the Program’s Diversity
AmeriCorps’ unlivable wages lock potential low-income members out of participation in the program—and out of public service careers altogether.
The Great Resignation—or Renegotiation—means we find ourselves in a historically competitive labor market in which employers must raise wages and improve benefits to attract talent. Where does AmeriCorps, a national service program that pays its participants, fit into this new economic paradigm?
Unfortunately for those who would participate in the program, AmeriCorps members, who work to improve communities’ public health, economic opportunity, climate resilience, and more, receive an entirely insufficient living stipend.1 The provided stipend ranges from $16,000 to—in a slim minority of available roles—about $30,000, depending on the host program and geography of a member’s placement. This allowance does not, in most places, translate to a livable wage, or even to the minimum wage. A $16,000 stipend spread over an entire work year works out to approximately $8 an hour, significantly below the minimum wage in many states and, for example, the $12 minimum for Walmart or the $18 average starting wage for Amazon.
This is a shame and a waste. Our nation needs the best service corps it can get, which means it needs members that come from and understand the diverse communities the program serves. Providing livable wages would make the program accessible to participants who do not have pre-existing means or support.
AmeriCorps’ unlivable wages lock would-be members out of the program—and out of public service careers.
“As a college drop-out at the time, City Year provided an invaluable opportunity to learn, grow, and give back to my home city. In truth, I was only able to complete my AmeriCorps year due to living at home where I paid reduced rent. That was over ten years ago. With the continued rise in cost of living, I am almost surprised that anyone can afford to serve.”
—Phil Ellison, AmeriCorps alumnus
The conditions that make AmeriCorps exclusionary are clear. The program doesn’t pay enough to cover rent, food, transit, and other basic necessities in most of its service areas, so would-be members must either take on debt to participate, use resources from elsewhere to cover their expenses (likely from family, and possibly including a place to live), or decline to consider, apply for, or accept an offer to join the program.
The nation’s racial wealth and income gaps mean that low wages allow for only wealthier participants, making the member population unrepresentative—in terms of race and ethnicity—of the United States and the low-income communities in which AmeriCorps members primarily serve. Black and Latino families’ median wealth clocks in at less than 20 percent of white families’ median wealth, and that reality has implications for who is likely to receive the family support that allows them to join an AmeriCorps program.
These low wages counteract AmeriCorps the agency’s stated goals. The agency lists increasing the diversity of its volunteer corps as an objective in its recently released strategic plan. Quoting the plan, success over the next five years will look like the following: “Race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic, and geographic diversity of members and volunteers progressively reflects the demographic diversity of those we serve.” This goal will be hard to achieve without making the program more accessible for individuals who do not have significant family resources, a constituency that is disproportionately of color. Also, when AmeriCorps host sites are often resource-strapped nonprofits and government offices serving communities in need, helping them avoid the enormous costs of employee turnover is imperative.
Who can become an AmeriCorps member is particularly important because it is perhaps the single largest paid pathway into public service for the country’s young people, supporting 75,000 individuals a year to enter nonprofit and government service. For young people who are interested in beginning careers in public service and serving their communities but who do not have the networks, experience, and knowledge to succeed in attaining individual government or nonprofit jobs as they are listed, AmeriCorps is often the best option. Yet, the program by design pays members less than their contributions are worth, locking out low-income members and limiting the pool of higher-income members who might otherwise apply.
“As an AmeriCorps VISTA, not receiving a living wage meant having to apply for, receive, and rely on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to buy food. This was a defeating feeling. I often thought to myself, if I’m serving to alleviate poverty in the United States, why do I feel like I’m contributing to the problem? Why is this federal organization, AmeriCorps, systematically and structurally having its members rely on public assistance to serve?”
—Cynthia, AmeriCorps alumna
Research suggests financial incentives can increase socioeconomic and racial diversity in public service and educational programs.
As in other contexts, raising wages, coupled with other provisions, could help increase the program’s socioeconomic, racial, and ethnic diversity. For example, there is substantial evidence that offering improved financial incentives and benefits in another type of public service program that targets young people, teacher residency programs—which recruit recent college graduates as new teachers, prominently feature financial incentives, and provide additional training and support—can increase the socioeconomic diversity of people entering teaching. A 2016 study found that more than double the proportion of people entering such residency programs were people of color, compared to the general population of people becoming teachers. A 2011 study noted higher retention rates for teachers of color in some of these programs than white teachers. More broadly, there is significant evidence that increasing pay improves educator recruitment and retention.
While less similar to AmeriCorps than teacher residency programs, which also employ young people, free college initiatives that offer financial support to educate young people have been shown to increase socioeconomic diversity. One 2020 study showed that the implementation of “Promise” programs led to large increases in the numbers of Black and Latinx students. Another 2016 study of the City University of New York’s (CUNY) Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) suggests that Black and Latinx students, who are more likely to be low-income, can benefit more than white students from free college. ASAP’s financial incentives and other supports had a greater impact on three-year graduation rates of Black and Latinx male students, compared to a matched comparison group that enrolled in traditional CUNY community college programs, than on the graduation rates of their white and Asian counterparts.
“Receiving a living wage would mean equitable access for future AmeriCorps members. Becoming an AmeriCorps member should not be at the expense of one’s personal economic safety and sacrifice. Anything less than a living wage is simply exploitation of those serving.”
—Cynthia, AmeriCorps Alumna
Increasing wages is a crucial first step toward improving AmeriCorps’s diversity.
It is promising that AmeriCorps supporters on both sides of the political aisle have supported legislation that would increase wages. Nonetheless, increasing wages is necessary, but not sufficient, to advance equity in AmeriCorps. As I and colleagues have argued elsewhere, the program needs to more intentionally recruit from the communities AmeriCorps serves, diversify grantee organizations, improve the program’s workforce development offerings as an entry point to careers in in-demand sectors, increase the size of the education benefit, and implement improved data collection to better understand who serves in, and is served by, the program. As the largest single pathway into public service in the nation, making AmeriCorps accessible to Americans of all backgrounds is vital to creating a more democratic and just United States.