"Can A Family Survive On The U.S. Minimum Wage?"

[uawchild]

By Basia Hellwig

"...
The Real Issue: Who Can Survive on Today's Minimum Wage?
The minimum wage is meant to be a living wage. “By living wages, I mean more than a bare subsistence level – I mean the wages of a decent living.” President Roosevelt’s words in 1933, five years before the first minimum wage became law.These days, it’s anything but a living wage. Someone working full-time at the federal minimum earns an annual paycheck of just $15,080 – below the poverty line for even a family of two. For the minimum-wage earner with a family of four, a full-time paycheck falls almost $9,000 below the poverty line, which is $23,850. Even a $10.10/hour full-time job – an annual $21,008 – falls short.

Pay is not the only problem with minimum wage jobs, either. Many don’t offer full-time hours, even when workers want them. And new shift-scheduling software which is cost-efficient for the employer (booking employees only at highest traffic times) can be hell for the employee. Ever-changing and on-call schedules, split shifts and the dreaded “clopening” (closing up the store at night and having to report early the next morning for opening) make it hard to take a second job or attend college classes or arrange for child care. Minimum-wage employees are also vulnerable to so-called wage theft, reducing their pay even further, a spate of recent lawsuits has revealed: everything from no overtime pay and erased time cards, to off-the-clock time employees are forced to spend checking schedules or going through lengthy security bag-checks.

The Typical Minimum Wage Worker
Contrary to stereotype, the typical minimum-wage worker is not a middle-class teenager earning pocket money. According to the CBO, based on Census Bureau data, 88% of minimum wage earners are adults 20 or older; 55% are women. For these adults and their families, proper housing is unaffordable, as a February 2015 report from the National Low Income Housing Coalition (based on federal data) shows: A minimum-wage earner would need to work, on average, 2.6 full-time jobs to rent a decent two-bedroom apartment for less than 30% of her or his income.

All of this helps explain why so many minimum-wage workers are also on some kind of public assistance. A University of California, Berkeley, study, for instance, found that more than half of fast-food workers are enrolled in one or more public programs. Forbes summed up the economic impact of this with the headline: “Fast Food Companies Outsource $7 Billion In Annual Labor Costs To Taxpayers.”

http://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/022615/can-family-survive-us-minimum-wage.asp

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Non-living wages are a form of corporate welfare, with society picking up the tab to meet underpaid workers' social needs.

There used to be dignity in labor, the idea of putting in an honest day's work for an honest day's pay -- now its all about cutting hours to cut benefits in a race to the bottom. Throw in the effects of under regulated globalization and its no wonder why at least 40% of Americans have seen their economic situation stagnate, at best, since the 1970s.

[Omaha Steve]

1. It is time for a living wage

K&R!

OS

[Wounded Bear]

2. Sure they can...

In Malawi.

But nowhere in the good ol' USA.

[Sunlei]

3. 2007 the federal minimum was raised from 5.15 to 7.25 took to 2009 to make it to 7.25.

2007 news Ds had to wrap the 2007-2009 minimum wage increase from $5 an hour into 121 billion for Bushes Iraq war profiteers


Wrapped into Iraq funding bill
That almost became the fate of this year’s proposal. Democratic leaders attached the provision to the $120 billion Iraq war spending bill, which was vetoed by the GOP-controlled White House on May 1 because Democrats insisted on a pullout date for American troops.

But with the House passing a rewritten bill 280-142 and the Senate 80-14, the end is likely near for the longest stretch without the federal pay floor rising since the minimum wage was established in 1938.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., called the increase one of “the proudest achievements of this new Congress.”

“We’ve overcome many obstacles — and faced every procedural trick in the book — to get this minimum-wage increase across the finish line,” Kennedy said. “Democrats stood together, and stood firm, to say that no one who works hard for a living should have to live in poverty.”

[TexasBushwhacker]

4. Okay, I fully support raising the minimum wage

BUT the current way that poor families get by is that they get EITC, food stamps, subsidized child care, Medicaid and if they're lucky, subsidized housing. A single parent with 2 children, making $15K a year will get $5400 from EITC and up to $6000 from SNAP. That single parent may be getting child support, subsidized housing and childcare, etc. In fact, the average family in the lowest quintile gets over $9K in these benefits. So that $15K is effectively $24K.

Now, to me, all those taxpayer funded benefits are subsidizing low paying employers. Some of them are companies that have billions in profits, like Walmart. To make up for all those benefits, Walmart should be paying the equivalent of $12 an hour for a 40 hour a week schedule. Even then, a family would receive EITC and SNAP, but they would receive less. Less burden on the taxpayers, more on the employers.

However, I don't want to put small struggling businesses out of business and I don't want low wage workers to lose their jobs. So I would like to see the minimum wage go up $1 to $2 per year until it hits $15 an hour and after that there is an automatic COLA every year. I don't have a problem paying young people under 20 less per hour, because I don't want to encourage any of them to drop out of high school either.

In the interest of breaking the cycle of intergenerational poverty, I think Colorado's program of providing highly effective birth control (implants and IUDs) to any teen or poor woman who is uninsured just makes financial sense. I realize that their legislature stupidly defunded it, but I would hope that some more left leaning states would start their own programs. The Medicaid savings alone more than pays for it, and then there's the savings in EITC, SNAP, etc. Maybe if we get a majority in Congress again we could pass a NATIONAL program! Hey, I can dream can't I?

[Victor_c3]

5. I agree with what you said about small businesses

I always thought some sort of a minim wage based on the number of employees a company employs. The more people a company employs, the higher it's minimum wage.

Small businesses aren't stuck having to report to stock investors who are looking for 10-15% growth year after year on their investments. They don't have to constantly grow in order to keep their investors happy. There is a difference in a mom and pop business that earns a decent middle class income for the owners who work in it and employ 2 or 3 other employees versus a Walmart that makes millions (billions) for the top few and hires thousands of minimum wage employees.

All of the growth demanded by the stock market can't be sustainable.

[Runningdawg]

6. You can live on min wage

if you are prepared to live a communal lifestyle. I know some people who have done this.
Mostly they are large extended families, but for the regular guy or girl - no way.

[Vinca]

7. It depends on how much they enjoy camping in the woods.

[hifiguy]

8. And eating squirrels.