Arkansans are employed. We boast a 3.8 percent unemployment rate. We have a structural problem. There are far too many jobs in Arkansas’s economy that do not pay a living wage. The Foundation’s Expect More Arkansas report finds that 70 percent of the jobs in Arkansas require a high school diploma or less, and the majority of those jobs do not pay enough for working Arkansans to support their families.

The Expect More Arkansas initiative’s equity goal is that all Arkansans, regardless of background and circumstance, have the education and skills to earn family-supporting wages through work or their own business and build generational wealth. Expect More Arkansas uses three strategies to pursue its equity goals: increase public will, build place-based models, and improve local and state public policies.