STATISTICS: SOCIAL SERVICES


                HIGHLIGHTS OF SOCIAL SERVICES IN WISCONSIN

  Public Welfare- U.S. Bureau of the Census data indicated that during the
1986-87 fiscal year
over $61 billion was spent on public welfare by state and local governments
in the United States.
This includes all welfare-related expenditures, such as institutions, medical
payments and direct
aid. Wisconsin spent $1.8 billion or $487.09 per capita, which ranked it
5th among the states.
The District of Columbia ranked 1st ($897.31) and New York 2nd ($640.81),
while Alabama
ranked lowest ($157.19).
  State and local welfare expenditures represented $35.18 per $1,000 of personal
income in Wis-
consin, ranking it 2nd among the states, while the District of Columbia ($45.97)
and New York
($37.56) again ranked highest, and Nevada lowest ($10.99).
  General Assistance and Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) in
Wisconsin
counties during 1988 totaled $505.4 million, granted to over 3.2 million
persons. The average
General Assistance grant was $154.20 and AFDC was $153.46. Milwaukee County
had the
highest AFDC grant total ($213 million) but Waukesha County had the highest
average grant
per recipient ($164.65). The lowest total was in Florence County ($.5 million);
lowest average
grant was in Taylor County ($137.94).
  Medical Assistance - Medical assistance expenditures in Wisconsin in fiscal
year 1988 totaled
$1.09 billion, a .24 percent decrease from the 1987 fiscal year. The largest
proportion of total
benefits was for providing nursing home care (51.7 percent) and inpatient
hospital services (12
percent). These 2 categories accounted for over 63 percent of the total,
with the remainder going
for the following services (in rank order): health maintenance organizations,
drugs, physician,
clinic and hospital out-patient.
  A county breakdown of medical assistance in January 1989 reveals a total
expenditure of
$93.24 million for 185,952 recipients, yielding an average user reimbursement
of $501.43. The
greatest.share of total benefits went to the counties of Milwaukee (31.3
percent), Dane (5.6 per-
cent) and Racine (3.8 percent); the least went to Florence (0.1 percent).
The highest average user
reimbursement per recipient was in Milwaukee County ($988.77); Menominee
County was low-
est ($170.28).
  Institutions - With the opening of Columbia and Oshkosh Correctional Institutions,
state
correctional institutions exhibited only small increases in their average
daily population from
1986 to 1988. The number of prisoners on probation and parole continued to
increase. A per
capita correctional expenditure rate of $44.77 ranked Wisconsin 32nd among
the states in 1987.
  The total average daily number of persons in state mental institutes, Central
State Hospital
and centers for the developmentally disabled declined from 1987 (2,429) to
1988,(2,299).
  The following tables present selected data. Consult footnoted sources for
more detailed
information.


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