I updated to Catalina more than a month ago, and since then I've not been able to make Pages show a word count. All the other commands in View work, just not word count.
iMac 21.5", macOS 10.15
Apple has changed the View menu nomenclature from the older "Show Word Count" to "Show Page Count" in Pages v8.2.1. Upon selection of that menu item, and its appearance as a floating palette at the bottom document center, click the right edge of it, and change the default Page count to Word count. It will remember the Word count setting.
This is how my Pages v8.2.1 works on macOS Catalina 10.15.2.
Apple has changed the View menu nomenclature from the older "Show Word Count" to "Show Page Count" in Pages v8.2.1. Upon selection of that menu item, and its appearance as a floating palette at the bottom document center, click the right edge of it, and change the default Page count to Word count. It will remember the Word count setting.
This is how my Pages v8.2.1 works on macOS Catalina 10.15.2.
Pages's word count not showing since updating to Catalina
