Statistics sometimes tell a story we don’t want to hear.

The region’s housing and income data tell a story about the struggle entry-level workers must endure just to call Butler County home. Simply stated, wages are too low and rents too high for many to afford living here.

The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in the county is $772 a month, according to a 2013 study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition. The average hourly wage of renters is $10.88 per hour — far below an income necessary to afford the average apartment, according to the coalition, which says a maximum 30 percent of total gross income should be spent on housing.

By the coalition’s standards, it would take an hourly wage of $14.88 — more than double the federal minimum wage of $7.25 — to support a $772 rental bill.

A worker earning the average $10.88 an hour would have to put in 56 hours a week to meet the 30 percent threshold. But even if they could physically sustain that number of work hours, the trend is for fewer hours, not more. Employers anticipating rising costs because of the Affordable Care Act are limiting many workers to less than 30 hours per week, thus preventing them from qualifying as full-time employees eligible for federally mandated health care benefits.

The financial burden of high rent tends to narrow options for low-wage workers. Roommates and second jobs are options. So is the modern-day version of homelessness known as “couch-surfing” — moving from apartment to apartment, sleeping on the sofas and guest beds of friends and relatives.

There are cheaper apartments available, but not many; among the more than 15,000 rental units in Butler County, only 3,000 or so are renting at less than $500 a month, according to the census bureau.

These are all stark realities among low-wage residents. Directors of housing and charitable agencies stress the problem is more about low wages than availability of affordable housing. Keeping this notion in mind, any remedy must include better jobs with better wages as an objective. That would require a continued commitment to policies that encourage jobs training and jobs retention.

“If you don’t have the income, it doesn’t matter where you live,” Perry O’Malley, director of Butler County Housing Authority, said in a recent interview. “The issue comes down to what we need to do for the less fortunate.”