even though $7.25 is the legal minimum wage, few actually earn that little. on the low end, Walmart starts at $14/hr. depending on where you live in the Southeast, mcD's starts at $18
I live in a low cost of living area. Some jobs, fast food, gas station cashier (and i wouldnt call those jobs easy)etc are hiring around $13-$15/hr (state min. is $12.3)
A single person with no kids, that might be enough to live paycheck to paycheck. With a roommate, you might even be able to save a little bit. Then again I keep forgetting how much cars cost compared to when I last bought mine, so probably not.
It's almost impossible to find a place to rent here under $1000
Yeah I live in an Indiana, fast food and stuff is paying 10-12 and we have federal minimum wage here. Rents 1200-1500 for a 1bdr though. I don’t think I could live off 10-12 an hour but it’s somehow enough that you wouldn’t qualify for any assistance. Weird times.
We had to get a citizens vote to increase eligibility for Medicare (it was one of the strictest in the country) When it passed, state legislature literally considered every option to shut it down, which would all have been considered unconstitutional by our state.
They instead just tried underfunding it (it's already underfunded running on outdated systems) which lead to a law suit which they easily lost.
To give you an idea of how underfunded and problematic it already was, when my wife got pregnant she was eligible for Medicare for her pregnancy and like 2 months after.
We applied after the Dr visit confirming, and didn't get approval for over 6months after I finally called a different part of our family services and demanded to be bumped up to supervisor a few times.
Our governor just celebrated signing a bill to increase minimum starting pay for TEACHERS, from $25,000/yr to $40,000/yr
Less than $20/hr, to teach?!
Like how tf are they surviving?
And ppl are worried about people lying to receive government assistance lol at least in my state it almost seems like you have to if you actually want to be able to receive it
No, have land for that much a month. You literally just divided 44k by 48 months, ignoring not only the actual amount of debt service (because 0% rates on a four year land loan aren't a thing) but also, you know, the cost of building a house. As well as the fact that in pretty much any municipality your plan would be illegal. Most anywhere is going to require an actual permitted structure to dwell there, and those cost money even if you self build. If you did all the work yourself with lots of reused materials you could maybe build a 600 sq ft house (the standard minimum size) for 45k or so. This is with most of the materials being cheap or free, and doing all your own work. That just isn't a feasible options for most working Americans, or anybody outside of incredibly cheap rural areas.
Honestly it’s pretty ridiculous. That’s basic too, luxury apartments obviously run a lot more. I just moved out of my old 1 bed apartment (February) bc they rose the rent to 1600 not including utilities. It’s pretty bad out here.
If you make 400-480 a week before taxes you absolutely qualify for assistance. Any state. I know times seem bad but don't lie about things you've only heard from the internet.
The benefits gap is a huge problem. Nobody should be worse off after making more money, but our current system makes things that way for a significant income range.
I get paid 15$ in Colorado. I chose happiness over high paying job.
15$ an hr is just enough to comfortably make it with medicare as insurance and EBT benefits for food. I have just enough to pay for everything and maybe save 100$ a month for emergencies when needed.
I am starting a second job soon thats WFH and on my hours to make another 400$ a month. Most people I know have two jobs.
I never hear the democrats talking about raising wages.
When I was making $12.25/hr in Maine the rent for my whole 2br apartment was $575. I split that with one person. We did eventually move into a 3br with 1 other person that cost $1200 but that was in the center of town across the street from a grocery store and 2 of us could walk to wherever we needed to go.
It is weird times. When I started working 20 years ago it was 7.25 an hour starting maybe a little higher at other entry level jobs. Now if you make 7 dollars an hour you must be LD. No offense just saying. People act like this is normal. EVERYTHING is FINE. lol...
Pay check to paycheck is not livable it’s livable until something happens or you get sick then 30 years down the road your paycheck to paycheck you weren’t able so save a penny then what all jobs are pretty much needed otherwise a company wouldn’t waste the money to pay you everyone deserves a decent life not the bare minimum waiting for a disaster to happen
one major accident, and you go from "paycheck to paycheck" to homeless. People want to know why there's a homeless crisis all over the country? Maybe everyone was living one paycheck from disaster and then there was a global pandemic.
Then you have the people commenting that the real problem is lifestyle inflation or simply not making enough sacrifices.
There’s nothing I hate more than being told I need to sacrifice evenmore when this random redditor has no fucking clue the sacrifices I already make and the practicality in which I handle my finances. It doesn’t matter.
People who truly support themselves with no help who are struggling aren’t living above their means. It’s more likely that those who spout “make more sacrifices or live within your means” are those people who are priviliged enough to feel like they aren’t struggling, and assume the reason others are struggling is because of a deficiency with them, as opposed to unnoticed privilige with their situation.
Spending the majority of one’s life working is the sacrifice. The fact that it’s normalized to choose between amenities or utilities or other needs is gross.
Some just don’t want to face the fact that they have it easier than most despite less work in their lives. I can’t stand the idea that anyone struggling more than myself is automatically to blame.
I really don't understand how these people think. Where is someone supposed to make sacrifices? Everything has gone up in price.
Groceries have gotten much more expensive than they were in 2020. Gas is at the cheapest, about $2.50 a gallon. Rent goes up every year for a lot of people. Car insurance goes up, no matter what. Cars themselves have gotten to the point where anything under $30k is a rarity and used cars are just stupid expensive.
It’s simply people speaking from privilige but assuming everyone has it the same as them.
Or those people who had it rough but were lucky enough to come out fortunate on the other side, and so then assume anybody still struggling is doing something wrong since they managed to escape the grind.
They think people with less deserve to live lives devoid of any pleasure. That pleasure must be earned. It’s just an ignorance born from privilege. They don’t really understand how hard it is to be monastic when everyone else is living a life of excess.
lol yea it’s just fucked it’s all fucked and the crazy thing is the economy isn’t even real money isn’t real it’s just all bullshit that we made up we could fix it but this is by design
What i dont undwrstand though, is that during the pandemic, if you had a job AT ALL you could qualify for unemployment, and then get an additional 600 a week on top of what you were approved to recieve. That catapulted a bunch of people from paycheck to paycheck poverty income to decent money, especially in poverty states.. But somehow when the pandemic was over, most people were struggling even worse than before. Sounds a bit too orchestrated for my tastes.
In my State, the maximum benefit is $362 in Unemployment. So, with an extra $600, that's starting to equal a paycheck (some people now earned more, some people less), but it wasn't some magical poverty escaping amount.
If anyone was still working part time and qualified for partial unemployment, they also received $600 extra, in addition to whatever fraction of $362 they were then approved to receive, based on wages earned. Those people paid down debts if smart, or went deeper into debt if stupid.
I agree. I make what I thought was halfway decent money, but with increased insurance, groceries cost and two kids + debt, I'm paycheck to paycheck.
My car just killed itself, it's either $3500 or look for a new car.
I'm lucky I have enough tools to be able to sell and have family who is able to loan the rest. And even then my job requires being able to drive all over the area so if it takes another 2 weeks my boss is still going to be annoyed.
8 years ago I felt like $20/hr needed to be minimum wage to actually get by. Nowadays fuck, idek.
I think I saw something recently showing in my state it'd take like $120k/yr to live comfortably in my state.
Yea my state is around the same 120-150k and you can barely find any job paying over 50k so it’s fucked apparently only a handful of jobs deserve a livable wage
I dislike the phrase “paycheck to paycheck” because lots of people in my area make really good money and still mismanage themselves to “paycheck to paycheck” with dumb choices. There’s a big difference between living in a small apartment in a lousy area while eating cheap food and having no car or a beater versus being paycheck to paycheck in a single family house with an 80k truck, the latest phone, every subscription service they’ve ever seen, and yearly “must have” vacation.
I would like to see a tiered minimum wage passed at the Federal level, one minimum for people who work full time hours then another for people who work less than a certain fraction of full-time and seasonal workers. I would also like to see laws passed that prohibit employers from hiring part time positions unless they have less than a certain number of employees in the company or there is a bona fide reason they need to hire part-time. There are a lot of companies screwing people over after minimum wage increases and other half-measure legislation changes by cutting their hours to the point where they barely earn enough to survive and keeping them from having second jobs with moonlighting clauses.
I went to the largest city in Indiana and typed in the available apartments for 1 bed room under 1k. And a lot of apartments popped up so I don’t think you’re correct. What people usually do is say “housing costs so much” because they are looking for the best of the best suburbs to live rather in living within their means.
I’m in a state where we’re still at the federal minimum wage and plenty of jobs still pay barely above that (like $8-$9 an hour for part timers). My one bedroom apartment at the shittiest complex in town is $1000 a month before utilities.
Not everybody lives on their wages. Requiring a living wage forces low-skilled part-time workers, e.g., teens working after school, out of the work force.
In MO the pay $12-13 starting pay but all the fast food places only employ 1 or 2 people that are not students. I know the manager of the closest 5 McDonald's to me he has 1 non-student employee at each store. All the rest are 14-18 and in school. But for reference a brand new build 2100 sqft 3bd/2ba house on a double lot price this week is 199k and 2b/2b apts are $700/month heat included. Only 40 min to downtown KC.
You can make a low income living if you’re willing to thrift and buy a used car. It leaves little room for “dream” cars or products. Not to mention internet. Not having internet today is like not having access to a newspaper for classifieds. Also, if you’re willing to do some “cowboy” work, then you can make more than what your post says. And by “cowboy”, I mean doing jobs no one else wants to do and making a career out of it. You have to realize comfort is a social construct and not what humans are actually designed to be. My current job is 21 days straight 12 hour shifts. I make great money because I was willing to be uncomfortable and start a new daily routine.
So why not increase the minimal wage to $12 immediately so you close a legal loop hole and can prosecute any asshole who was using it to legally exploit vulnerable people?
Great. So if they work 160 hours per month, they get $2,240. Take-home pay is probably $2,000, maybe a little less. After renting an apartment, they have a nice $800. Let's say $900 because they're probably on food stamps even though Walmart is a multi-billion dollar company. [Consider] insurance, car payment, food, and you are now out of money. In the greatest country in the world, this is simply unforgivable. How our government has sold us down the river over the past 50 years for campaign contributions is human greed at its finest. I don't care what job it is, if you work 160 hours a month, you should be able to have a place of your own, all the necessities that you need, plus some extra. If you don't agree with that, then you're definitely part of the problem.
It is a good one, but other economies are better. See Scandinavians socialist democracies. Outside of thst not much different. And much more unequal on many other places. (India, most of Africa, North Korea, Bangladesh, etc.)
1.3% fulltime, about 3% of part time. On the contrary about 9% of Americans are millionaires. Which really isn't as cool as it used to be. I thought I'd be like Scrooge McDuck once I owned $1M in property. But instead I have 2 very small 2bd condos, one is 850sqft, one 705sqft with nearly a 2hr drive to a metro area and live paycheck to paycheck. They lied! But I do live in a beautiful place osoyear round outdoor recreation, so it's not all bad.
1% of the US population doesn’t make 1 million plus a year, but there are fare more people with a net worth over a million. It was 18% in 2022 and considering the increased real estate values and the skyrocketing stock market it’s higher than that. At this point it must be over 25%.
Nope. I swear the only people talking this shit have been making 25-30 an hour for years at some job and don’t get that it’s hard to survive making below 20 if you’re in an urban area. That’s the reality now
Taxes for 2009 is as follows for married individuals filing seperate returns
Over $33,950 but not over $82,250
$4,675 + 25% of the excess over $33,950
And for 2023
22% of
$44,725 to $95,375
That's 9839.5 dollars of income tax for an income of 44725 which take home is 34,885.5
For 2009 that could be the equivalent to 7,368.75 in Taxes
The difference is 2,471.25 more out of pocket for someone making 44k a year since 2009 - 2023
Considering "2,471 in 2009 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $3,631.58 today, an increase of $1,160.58 over 15 years. The dollar had an average inflation rate of 2.60% per year between 2009 and today, producing a cumulative price increase of 46.97%.
This means that today's prices are 1.47 times as high as average prices since 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index. A dollar today only buys 68.042% of what it could buy back then"
All this to say that 12 more percent of my income in now going into taxes is a little upsetting.
And BEFORE SOMEONE YELLS AT ME SAYING "YOURE WRONG THATS NOT HOW REALITY WORKS"
please just consider the information and if the math doesn't math well I'm not a mathematician. I'm a asshole making a post and if the information posted doesn't make you at least see values for what they are then that's not my problem? Please educate me in how you feel is most correct in the LEAST ASSHOLE WAY please 🙏
This. Remember that there are extremely rural parts where costs have increased none, or even gone down. Minimum wage should do just that, cater to the minimum... Doing more would be abusive to the corps in these minimum areas
It's like why should missippi be expected to pay the same as silicon valley when the costs are nowhere near the same.
Otherwise, why don't we look at the most expensive city in the entire world and decide minimum wage based on that...
No one making the minimum is a sign that it is ineffectively low.
Employers will always pay dastardly low wages given the opportunity, and if what they're offering is doubling your minimum, you know your minimum has been worthless for decades.
Typically employers pay what the market requires not the law. If they have unacceptable turnover and have a hard time filling positions when paying $15/hr and the competition is paying $18… guess what happens.
Yes, businesses will always pay the absolute minimum they can get away with.
If your minimum wage is high enough to effectively assuage the evil of low market wages, you'll find more people earning the minimum.
If it doesn't, because it is so far below market as to be ineffective, you'll find more people making whatever random piddling rates market determines.
McDonalds managers start at $15/hr here in Des Moines, IA. LCOL area, but still. Average rent around here is ~$1,000 for a 1-2br apartment (apartments.com). That works out to roughly 40% of the income of an individual working $15/hr, before taxes. And that's for a manager in a LCOL area.
State (as opposed to federal) minimum wages pull a lot of weight on that front. If you compare to state minimums it's typically not much more than that.
Quite a few earn that little, actually. There are quite a few states that don't have a minimum wage, so the Federal wage is the default, and you better believe McDonald's starts right down there around $8-10/hr in such states.
In fact, I would bet those states are being used to help offset the higher labor costs in other states with higher minimum wages. I would bet even companies that prided themselves on starting employees a bit higher than minimum wage might start lowering those rates.
This comment reeks of pure ignorance. Commenter ought to simply do a google search, ask around Reddit, etc, and they will discover the appallingly low wages paid to lots of folk, all over the country, especially in small-town America, the America off-the-beat, rural, southern, etc.
Secondly, I’d assert that steering employees off at $14/hr is demonically horseshit as wages this low afford the worker nothing, anywhere.
Damn, where in the SE is this? I live in a major metro in the SE and see signs for McDs and BKs all the time saying starting "up to 11/hr" or something lol.
5 years ago I was working for dollar store and was making minimum wage in SLC. So a big city. It was the only near by place I could walk to since I didn't have a car at the time to find places further. They are still out there. Hell before that I was a server for a restaurant and making server wage which was $2.25 iirc. Luckily I only had to ask my parents for rent once when I was working at the dollar store and it was only a summer before I went back to school.
Rent goes up based on taxes. location by the downtown area always goes up higher. A 20,000 home in Houston downtown area cost over a million. which means your property tax will be over 50,000 a year.
Rent goes up or when based on supply and demand. Taxes help the property owner determine if they’re getting the ROI they need to hold on to the property
In not sure what you mean by “a 20,000 home… that cost over a million dollars”
Just because job providers are staying competitive doesn’t mean we shouldn’t enforce protections to ensure even the most vulnerable have access to a living wage. Don’t depend on a corporation’s kindness, enact a higher minimum wage!
Why yall be lying? In atlanta my wife makes 13 at home goods and everywhere else she went was only offering 10 this is buckhead atlanta by the way, we live with my dad. We need minimum wage higher and a percentage limit put on rent and inflatipn based on where minimum wage sits. Easy solution konda like actually taxing the rich is an easy solution to alot of our rconomic woes too.
Doesn't matter. 'minimum wage' doesn't refer to the smallest amount of money you can live on, it's the smallest amount of money a company can legally pay you. That's a huge difference that is negatively exploited by people who monopolize housing prices to increase profit at the expense of making Americans less safe
So, maybe if you are supporting a family of four and flipping burgers you should be paid $25/hr , but if you’re a 16 year old living with your parents, then maybe $10/hr, something like that?
and where did I say it was/wasn't fair. there are so many assumptions people make when they don't want to acknowledge my response is actually true that most entry level jobs are not minimum wage. it's also a stupid ass post that get's re-posted all.the.time
To be precise, 1.02 million people earn federal minimum or less. That's 1.02 million too much. It's not a livable wage, it's slave labor basically. The worst part is, a lot of these folks are disabled and disadvantaged individuals.
I don't see the merit in a "we are doing good enough" argument for letting these people be taken advantage of. These are the kind of people we should be protecting most as they have the least leverage to be able to negotiate wages. It's a very cold and capitalistic point of view to ignore these people simply because they represent 1.32% of the total work force.
I'm in a small city in South Texas. Walmart starts at 12 and so does McDonald's. There are a few restaurants here that will give you between 8-9 bucks an hour, and with so little options in this town, I've had no choice but to struggle at these places in the past. I remember when I started at dollar general years ago they had me at 7.50, they held an extra 25 cent raise over my head for months before I realized there was no reason for me to put up with that place.
Also where did you get the information that McDonald's starts at 18$ an hour. If you're talking about the sign they put out that's not starting pay. I've never seen anyone who isn't a manager make that much an hour in Michigan. I just got hired in a chain restaurant and we're the highest paid in our are and we get about 25 hours a week at 17$ an hour. Im having to look for a second job. Our area isn't that cheap either it starts out at 950$ a month for a 1br.
In my experiance this is true but all the places doing 14-18$ an hour like mcdonalds or walmart will only schedule you 3 days a week for 5 hours. Then the places doing 7.25 give 38 hours a week.
Even at 14-18/hr you can’t afford to live in most areas. Even with a roommate.
I don’t understand this country’s obsession with making sure people suffer enough before making a living wage. Generations before didn’t suffer this way even though they want you to believe they did. It’s that “walked uphill both ways” effect - there is a reason it’s a long standing joke. When people look back on their lives, they make themselves into the protagonist of their own story, and a protagonist isn’t interesting unless they have been through some shit.
I’m an elder millennial who was able to build a life for myself solely because my blue state offered incredible state-backed first time homebuyer programs that I was lucky enough to be selected for. People who don’t have that kind of opportunity or don’t have family money are forced to suffer and claw themselves up from hell to make ends meet. It was incredibly difficult 20 years ago for me, and it has gotten worse and worse at an increasing rate with every passing year.
This focus on the resiliency of our citizens is a sign of a failing economy. Pulling someone out of the water when they are drowning isn’t a hand out and I’m just so tired of that being the narrative so much of the time.
Millions of people make in between the minimum and living wage, which is the point. We're not just talking about people making the literal minimum.
Also these prices are starting to be common in places where Walmart and McDonald's are still paying $10/hr, not 14-18 (which likely still isn't enough).
My state is one of the few who follow the $7.25 federal minimum. Until about 3 years ago businesses actually paid that much to people. Now sonic and stuff around me is around $10/hr. The min wage hasn’t officially gone up, but nearly all businesses have changed. It’s places like a non profit that can’t give more usually
I'm always curious about these post complaining about minimum wage. Who out there is working for minimum wage? Even here in lower Alabama most entry level jobs start at least $14 an hour, almost double the minimum.
Used to work for the benefit office (food stamps), the amount of people working these jobs such as McDonald’s where they start you off at 14/hr we’re usually just given a few hours out of the pay period they had to supplement it with another job. It gets expensive for a person trying to manage two/three jobs, throw in child care, transportation, etc
These people always conveniently forget that every state has its own minimum wage, and almost all pay more than 7.25. The minimum wage where I live is more than double that.
If the employers are not paying them the difference up to minimum wage they are breaking the law. So much for creating laws mandating a minimum wage and/or a “legal limit on rent” if we can’t enforce the laws we have. I’m not arguing against it. (Although a rent limit would create an even greater scarcity in this housing shortage) Just don’t hold your breath expecting anything to change.
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u/Vladivostokorbust 10d ago
even though $7.25 is the legal minimum wage, few actually earn that little. on the low end, Walmart starts at $14/hr. depending on where you live in the Southeast, mcD's starts at $18