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Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

citylab.com

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Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#141

Post by notacoward »

sdinsn wrote: post #135
notacoward wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe not for you. For the 37-year-old average retail worker, who might have kids and might not have many other skills, maybe not so much. Not everyone is like you. In particular, many people in the demographic we're talking about might not be like anyone you've ever spent any time with.

I'm aware not everyone is like me. And also not everyone is a "37-year-old retail worker". If you want to dismiss my comment, that's fine, but you should delete your own to avoid hypocrisy.

[flagged]

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#142

Post by SomeOldThrow »

bluGill wrote: post #122
SomeOldThrow wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The hard part about moving is leaving family, friends, and stuff behind Tell that to the homeless, I dare you. It's certainly the attitude of a sheltered existence.

The homeless have problems mostly unrelated to minimum wage.

This claim is based on... what? Your wandering around the tenderloin and judging people?

Try visiting shelters, especially in the south bay. There are plenty of families without the problems you mentioned.

This attitude is intentional neglect of reality, and its prevalence is literally killing people.

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#143

Post by notacoward »

leetcrew wrote: post #138
notacoward wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can look at what I spend to sustain myself every month ...and in doing so you make certain assumptions which might not be true for others. Like that your circumstances can only get better, never worse. The GP specifically asked about the latter, in the form of job loss. What if you decided that you were ready to have that child, quite reasonably acccording to those assumptions , and then those assumptions turned…

I wasn't very clear. if you make a reasonable effort to plan ahead and something totally unforseen causes you to be unable to support your children, that really sucks and I would be happy to contribute tax dollars to help people in this situation. I don't think minimum wage is the best way to solve this though; probably direct aid would be more suitable. also, my heuristic is meant to be more like a bloom filter. you…

That seems much more reasonable. Thank you for clarifying.

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#144

Post by leetcrew »

titusjohnson wrote: post #140
leetcrew wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm mainly objecting to the term "living wage". people who use it are usually unwilling to commit to a specific set of things that a "living wage" should pay for, but are perfectly happy to exploit the term as a rhetorical technique to smear anyone who slightly pushes back on them. if by "living wage" you mean "able to afford food and shelter", I'm 100% with you; any full-time job should support that. if you bump it…

Awesome, sounds like you're on board with the common definition of Living Wage ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_wage ): "secure food, shelter, clothing, health care, transportation and other necessities of living in modern society".

no I don't think I am. from the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article:

> The goal of a living wage is to allow a worker to afford a basic but decent standard of living. Due to the flexible nature of the term "needs", there is not one universally accepted measure of what a living wage is and as such it varies by location and household type.

this is what I'm saying. who knows what I'm committing to if I say I support a "living wage"?

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#145

Post by imgabe »

mlevental wrote: post #121
maxlybbert wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You 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.

again - that has almost nothing to do with what i asked. bls: 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…

> 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)

And making minimum wage over the age of 25 is also outside of the typical pay, so it would make sense that they might be in the atypical situation of, say, still living with their parents. Only 2.7% of ALL workers are even making minimum wage to begin with [1], so you're talking about maybe 1.4% of workers over 25. Of those, some may be retired and have other sources of income. Some may have a spouse who makes much more and the are not dependent on the minimum wage income. So the remaining workers who are actually dependent on one minimum wage job to support themselves or their families are very much an edge case, since we're talking about probably less than 1% of all workers.

[1] https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2016/home.htm

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#146

Post by TylerE »

SomeOldThrow wrote: post #92
leereeves wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like Venezuela, Cuba, and the Soviet Union? Those alternatives aren't better.

Look at singapore for an alternative that isn’t associated with anti-socialized scare tactics. Soviets had a lot of issues but lack of housing wasn’t one of them. Same for cuba, although the sanctions have crippled the economy to make quality housing difficult. I can’t speak for venezuela housing as i have not researched it, and it seems weird to clump a country with a mostly private economy in with self-proclaimed c…

A somewhat ironic example given the subject at hand

https://www.propertyguru.com.sg/property-management-news/201...

"House prices in Singapore are considered “seriously unaffordable”, with a median multiple of 4.6, which means that the median house price is 4.6 times the city-state’s median household income, according to an annual survey."

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#147

Post by sdinsn »

notacoward wrote: post #141
sdinsn wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm aware not everyone is like me. And also not everyone is a "37-year-old retail worker". If you want to dismiss my comment, that's fine, but you should delete your own to avoid hypocrisy.

[flagged]

I was plenty aware before. I was sharing my personal experiences. Someone who is a 37year old retail worker is free to share theirs as well. It appears like you are a bad actor and will dismiss anything that violates your 'reality'.

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#148

Post by notacoward »

sdinsn wrote: post #147
notacoward wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I was plenty aware before. I was sharing my personal experiences. Someone who is a 37year old retail worker is free to share theirs as well. It appears like you are a bad actor and will dismiss anything that violates your 'reality'.

So interpreting your over-general statement exactly as written makes someone a bad actor? If you want to share personal experience, identify it as such ("for me") instead of expressing it as a general rule. If you want to provide a counterexample to an overly general statement, use words like "might" (as I did) to indicate that. Don't gaslight readers about what you originally said, and don't attribute evil motives to anyone who points it out. Those Reddit-level tricks will only convince anyone reading the exchange that you're the one arguing in bad faith.

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#149

Post by mlevental »

imgabe wrote: post #145
mlevental wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

again - that has almost nothing to do with what i asked. bls: 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…

> 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) And making minimum wage over the age of 25 is also outside of the typical pay, so it would make sense that they might be in the atypical situation of, say, still living with their parents. Only 2.7% of ALL workers are even making minimum wage to…

you linked to 2016 when i linked to 2018 report. why?

>since we're talking about probably less than 1% of all workers.

cool. congrats on proving it's an edge case. A+ case analysis.

so what? it's cool with you that 1.3 million people can't afford housing? even if it were 0.1% of workers? why should literally anyone be unable to afford housing? we're not talking iphones and gucci bags here - we're talking about the bare minimum needed to stay off the street.

Re: Minimum Wage Still Can’t Pay For A Two-Bedroom Apartment Anywhere

#150

Post by mgraczyk »

Damorian wrote: post #115
mgraczyk wrote: post #15

On the other hand, if this weren't the case I think it would be even more strange. "Law requires companies to automate or illegally hire any job worth less than a 2-bedroom home"

Is there anything wrong with this? If a job can't provide for a person at some (philosophically debatable) level, it's not a job worth doing, free market be damned. We could take this to a logical extreme and think of all the jobs that could exist in the absence of a minimum wage and basic human necessity, but the reality is both of these exist. Either it's "worth" more for an employer to pay them more, or automating…

Yes, there is plenty wrong with this. It is a strange economic intervention that distorts incentives and rarely helps low-wage populations or innovation. Unfortunately there are other options besides "automate" or "pay more".

For example, you can pay people under the table, outsource, close down your business (as many restaurants do), change your business model to require less labor (many restaurants in the US are switching from full service to counter-serve). None of these are good for workers.

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