7 ms·
It seems that minimum wage is not, in fact, supposed to support a person 100%, not especially a family.
by OceanKing 7y ago
It seems that minimum wage is not, in fact, supposed to support a person 100%, not especially a family.
- ocdtrekkie 7y agoI am not sure why people think minimum wage must be enough to afford a two-bedroom home. Ideally minimum wage should comfortably allow one person to support... Themselves, minimally. Which means a studio or one bedroom. People should not aim to remain at minimum wage long, but use it as an entry point for somewhere better.
- overthemoon 7y agoWhy not? Why shouldn't it? Why is this the proper state of things?
- ocdtrekkie 7y agoBecause it in no way makes sense for someone to hire a first time employee who still lives with their parents for a zero skill job at the rate of "enough to afford a two-bedroom house".
- SketchySeaBeast 7y agoIsn't there a huge conceit that that's who earns minimum wage? Looking around my local wal-mart, it would appear many people first entered the job market at weird times in their lives.
- sct202 7y agoWalmart's starting pay is $11 now, so they aren't even at minimum wage anymore.
- leetcrew 7y agoWalmart actually pays considerably more than minimum wage, so I'm not sure what point you are making here.
- SketchySeaBeast 7y agoI see now that changed recently, though I didn't see any demographics shifts in who are being employed. And you know exactly the point I was trying to make.
- mlevental 7y ago> a first time employee who still lives with their parents what makes you think this is the typical minimum wage earner?
- maxlybbert 7y agoThe minimum wage is “the least you can pay anyone for any reason.” If you set it too high, then first time workers who still live with their parents won’t be able to get jobs. At all.
- mlevental 7y agothat has almost nothing to do with what i asked
- maxlybbert 7y agoYou asked “what makes you think this is the typical minimum wage earner?” I answered “if you don’t take that case into account when setting minimum wage, then that worker won’t be able to get a job.” Minimum wage is the least you can pay anyone for any reason. It is, by definition, an edge case.
- mlevental 7y agoagain - that has almost nothing to do with what i asked. bls: https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2018/pdf/home.pdf https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2018/pdf/home.... > Although workers under age 25 represented only about one-fifth of hourly paid workers, they made up just under half of those paid the federal minimum wage or less. that means just over 50% of minimum wage earners are older than 25 (well outside the typical age where you're still living with your parents or just entering the workforce) >It is, by definition, an edge case. it is de-facto not an edge case.
- maxlybbert 7y agoWhile I’m sure most people over 25 still making minimum wage would prefer a pay raise, and for the sake of argument, I’ll even accept that the world would be a better place if they got that pay raise, if you raise the minimum wage enough that it’s no longer profitable to hire inexperienced workers, then those potential workers will be locked out of the market. I acknowledge that there’s a serious problem if millions of experienced workers are unable to get more than minimum wage, but I would prefer we fix that by helping those workers become more valuable, not by putting a “you must be this tall to ride” sign on entry level jobs.
- NotAnEconomist 7y agoBecause "minimum wage" is the floor of the economic spectrum -- and basic economics dictates that if some people have more money, they'll drive their desires purchases above the price someone with less can afford. However, you need to pay more for some jobs, because they're harder or require more skill. Further, empirically, stratified-by-economics societies are more stable than forced-equal-by-government societies.
- pingpongchef 7y agoMinimum wage is an artificial value which is propped up by law, and can change without respect to an individual's situation. It would be better to aim for the highest wage an individual can get in exchange for labor.
- Johnny555 7y agoThat's fine in an area where these better paying jobs are available, but in many areas of the country, well paying jobs for unskilled workers are scarce, and support systems to help these unskilled workers improve their skills are nonexistent. It can be hard to a person to pull himself out of life-long poverty.
- Kalium 7y agoPeople are using a 1950s-era nuclear family model, with the idea that a minimum wage should support a family of at least two adults and one child. Preferably with a yard, lawn, dog, and white picket fence.
- true_religion 7y agoMinimum wage doesn’t track inflation. If it did, I would have no complaints. But it’s hard for me to understand people saying minimum wage should only be for one person eking out a bare existence, when it’s value in real money has fallen over the past 70 years.
- Kalium 7y agoWould you be happy if minimum wage was CPI-indexed to track the cost for one adult's bare-bones existence? Obviously this also requires defining what that minimum is, as social norms are also subject to inflation - when a US minimum wage was introduced boarding houses were common. Now they're unheard of.
- true_religion 7y agoThat would be fine, as it would mean that we as a society explicitly agree what minimum wage should be about. And we would probably have massive campaigns to get adults with families off the minimum wage, as well as ensure that adults never have to take a minimum wage job in the future. We could leave minimum wage to children, and charity workers. As it stands, it used to pay better but has slowly slid to being subsistence living.
- xienze 7y agoWhat everyone fails to realize is that every job has a maximum value associated with it, and therefore a maximum wage, assuming your employer isn’t in the business of losing money. When you raise the minimum wage to $X/hr, by necessity employers (again, in the interests of not losing money) will no longer be able to offer jobs that generate less than $X/hr in revenue. This becomes a problem for people who lack the skill to perform a job that generates at least $X/hr — they become unemployable, either through job elimination or automation.
- fuzz4lyfe 7y agoAt this point the federal minimum wage is a anachronism. Market forces have risen wages well past it. It doesn't really serve much of a purpose anymore. For example the average Walmart employee makes twice the federal minimum wage.
- djschnei 7y agoEh I'm not positive it should even be able to support a single person... Why do we insist on raising the bar for employment so high? If a 16 year old wants to get their first job, they shouldn't be required right of the bat have a productive output sufficient to support themselves. That's not the point of minimum wage jobs - or at least it never was until we started arbitrarily setting a minimum value.
- tcfunk 7y agoThat's all well and good if 16 year olds are the only ones making minimum wage. And if their parents haven't kicked them out of the house already because they got pregnant too early. Or have a sexual orientation that their parents don't agree with. Or..
- true_religion 7y agoIt would be easier and better to just help out edge cases directly. A 16 year old kicked out of their house for a pregnancy shouldn’t be forced to work minimum wage, but rather receive community support so they can finish schooling and rise to the point where they can prosper.
- imgabe 7y agoDo we need to handle those edge cases by mandating what employers have to pay ALL employees? Maybe there is a better way to help people in needy situations without distorting the labor market for everyone.
- suby 7y ago16 year olds working min wage is the edge case. The average retail worker for instance is 37. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://familiesandwork.org/downloads/TurnoverAndRetail.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwidpaCDl_biAhXGqlkKHUFuBjQQFjABegQIDxAG&usg=AOvVaw2QfCizk_emgU0YIDzaDwgO https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https:/...
- 7y ago
- ufo 7y agoSupporting only one person means that there is not enough left to support any children. Or a sick relative. Or to otherwise live a fulfilling life. Not everyone has the opportunity to move on to a better paying job.
- SomeOldThrow 7y ago> I am not sure why people think minimum wage must be enough to afford a two-bedroom home Disregarding the home part (cities are being ruined by single family deatched homes)--because if that's not true, then America has failed its citizens. Also, I hate to be the person to bring this up against my own post, but downvoting because you disagree with me is not good for productive conversation. Dogmatic belief in real-estate-as-investments is not going to solve anything—having this conversation isn’t going to destroy your investment as a homeowner or even landlord.
- shados 7y agoYeah this is a bit confusing. If minimum wage was enough to afford a 2 bedroom, why would we even bother building 1 bedroom and studios? So people who could otherwise afford 2 BR downgrade?
- willhk 7y agoNobody aims to remain at minimum wage... The problem is we've been doing a great job of hollowing out the middle of our economy and replacing it with a relatively small amount of upper middle-class tech jobs and massive VC backed profits. This often leaves minimum wage jobs the only option for people who used to make more but their career tanked for reasons outside their control
- zeendo 7y agoPeople probably think this because they've given it more than the 30 seconds of thought that you have.
- ustolemyname 7y agoDoes not. What it should and should not do is a subjective matter.
- titusjohnson 7y agoI can agree that the minimum wage was never intended to support a family 100%. However, stating that it was never intended to support a person 100% is just flat out ignorant. The history of minimum wage is easily read up on.
- anarchodev 7y agoExactly, it's meant for high school kids looking for pocket money! That's why McDonald's is always closed during school hours.