This is a pretty heavy load:
Of course the unsaid part is if the worker has no skills and only puts forward unmotivated work. Also “living Wage” is a loaded term. Back when I was working for minimum wage I was an unskilled teen with a non-existent resume, and I was still living rent-free with my parents. As I got older I still had friends working at or near minimum wage. They were working low-skilled jobs, and often working the bare minimum required of them. They lived in crappy apartments with multiple roommates. They drove shitbox cars and ate a LOT of ramen noodles and delivery pizza.
They were paid a “living wage” for the lifestyle they made do with. Still if they wanted more (and many of them did) they needed to elevate themselves, and many of them did.
Its really not hard to get promoted if you work at minimum wage. Work hard, build up your skills, and get promoted, or find a better job!
More from ‘Zo!
There SHOULD be jobs for high school kids who live with their parents and just want to have a little bit of beer money- err- I mean save up for college text books. What about them?
Let’s not encourage people not to pursue advancement by making sure they get to live a decent lifestyle without any effort.
Aside from that, I have a relative who only worked minimum wage jobs. He had lots of problems with drugs and alcohol, but straightened his life out by working a ton of hours (usually three different minimum wage jobs). The hours kept him out of trouble. He lived frugally, saved up, bought some beach front condos, and is now retired at 46 living off the rental income.
“Let’s not encourage people not to pursue advancement by making sure they get to live a decent lifestyle without any effort. ”
And this is the issue. Too many feel they have a ‘right’ to cable tv, smart phones, nice cars/homes and entertainment. It also makes a nice talking point for politicians to get votes from these same individuals.
Weerd, I don’t know what your childcare plans are, but there is an easily illustrated point about the impacts of these types of policies. Say you want to hire a fulltime nanny. The only way this employment makes sense is for there to be a substantial “income gap” between your wife (or you) and the nanny. Otherwise you’re basically working to pay the nanny. The nanny is paid for more hours because of commute time and lunch, but the big bite is what the government takes out in taxes of both the parent and nanny’s pay. It’s easy to do the math and figure out that even a professional class worker is only banking five bucks an hour (maybe still putting something away for 401K). So where’s my “living wage”? The result is it kills off that job opportunity and the child ends up in a large daycare with a bunch of other babies, or the employment goes under the table to an illegal immigrant.
That’s a really inspirational story!
One of the guys I work with started out at minimum wage working in a pet store, and moved up to an entry level animal tech, and through hard work and employer-supplied education now probably makes more than I do while being a few years younger than me.
It takes a little luck, and a LOT of hard work, but its hardly an impossible task.
And let’s face it, if they were willing to work hard, they wouldn’t be crying for a living wage with zero skills well into adulthood.
Up the minimum wage to what is considered ‘living wage’ levels, and it ain’t a living wage anymore. Because now you have to up everyone’s wages, which in turn starts upping the prices of everything, and I’d like to say that we’re right back where we started, except we’re not. Because now more jobs have either been exported overseas or given to illegals working under the table.
“Because now you have to up everyone’s wages”
I’ve yet to have that happen in any job I’ve worked in when the min. was increased but prices have still gone up.