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Work Culture: Minimum Wage and the Cost of Living

gimmepie

gimmepie

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So, in many countries the cost of living is creeping higher and higher while the minimum wage is comparatively low. But on top of that, there's often a social/political stigma about dependence on welfare programs and people are generally expected to just work harder/more if they are unable to make ends meet.

What steps can we take to make living more affordable for the average person? Or is the solution to simply work more?
 
Yue Han

Yue Han

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Simple answer but simply: raise the minimum wage along with the ever increasing cost of living.

As far as the stigma about benefit programs goes I'd say, more often than not, the ones with the problem are the ones throwing the stones towards the apparent "benefit scroungers" than these (usually) very vulnerable people that need to use these programs because the system is broken. And that those said 'stone throwers' need to wake up and see that the real scrounger problem we have (as far as the UK is concerned): is of those in power positions using public money to claim expenses on a variety of things they can and should pay out of their own pocket, while at the same time using the poor as a scapegoat to deflect... but I digress.

Is the solution simply to work more?

I'd say people are working as just hard as in the time of the baby boomers, if not harder. Those opportunities and perks the generation before had just simply don't exist anymore but to some degree we're they're still acting like that is the world we still live in and people these days are just lazier because we can't achieve what they could (decent wage, buying a house, an affordable car that's nice).
 
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FlameChrome

FlameChrome

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Well for the state i live in, minimun wage is $10.10/h. Low, but it goes decently with how much things cost today. But struggles are still there of living paycheck to paycheck.

Yue Han, only problem with that is as minimum wage increases, cost of products and services increases with it, so it will hardly ever balance out.
 
gimmepie

gimmepie

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FlameChrome said:
Yue Han, only problem with that is as minimum wage increases, cost of products and services increases with it, so it will hardly ever balance out.
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This is why I am of the opinion that certain essential items and services should be tax-free and price-capped. That prevents people from being in a situation where they are struggling to afford basic living essentials when the minimum wage is increased.
 
FlameChrome

FlameChrome

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gimmepie said:
This is why I am of the opinion that certain essential items and services should be tax-free and price-capped. That prevents people from being in a situation where they are struggling to afford basic living essentials when the minimum wage is increased.
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and the problem with that is, tax doesnt put much of a dent in your wallet, specially compared to how much the items cost. Sure you might save about a dollar or 3 each time you get tax free to get the stuff like food, but that price will still go up. At least in my state, sales tax is only .06 cents per dollar, so its not that much anyways. Most people dont even think of think of tax when trying to afford stuff like food, specially when food makes a dent of $100 each week or so, maybe monthly.
 
for him.

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Just having tax on top of all these other expenses is a burden. It also depends on the area too. I live in the Bay Area, so prices are already pretty high, and they just keep getting higher. Minimum wage is rising, but it isn't raising high enough to say afford rent, food, and utilities on your own on a 40hr work week. I don't see prices plateauing in the future because now Google is opening up in San Jose on top of the BART extension.
 
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Kitty

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From someone who lives in a place where minimum wage isnt enough to live decently (note: decent is different from just barely getting by - barely getting by is having no savings and only buying the absolute minimum of what you need) if youre in the capital, you can't exactly just "work more" without having companies fight you for not focusing on them etc etc

One nice step I saw happening here (ph) was people that only have x amount of net pay per year go about their lives with their salaries tax free. Which is a nice step for the people who really are on the bare minimum of minimum wage.

Id agree with increasing minimum wage but that comes with its own bundle of business consequences like cost of living increases (and wouldnt that just be the same thing)?
 
lloebet

lloebet

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I live in a place where 7.25 is minimum wage and I had to work 3 jobs for a while until I worked my up to 11 dollars an hour on 40 hours a week for one of the jobs. Can now afford to have my own little place comfortably and if I continue I'll be making around 17 in 2 years. There really isn't a good solution for this problem otherwise it would have been done already. It's just the way it's always going to be. You just need to work extremely hard and you will be rewarded. Some people just don't want to have to work hard for a system that can't be fixed.
 
Nah

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lloebet said:
You just need to work extremely hard and you will be rewarded. Some people just don't want to have to work hard for a system that can't be fixed.
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idk about you, but I don't think that people should have to bend over backwards to do stuff very basic like have a roof over their head or not starve to death (and be secure in knowing that they can do these things). Work for it, sure, but the reward should be proportionate to the effort put in.
 
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On top of that, the minimum wage was meant to be a living wage to begin with iirc.
 
FlameChrome

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for him. said:
On top of that, the minimum wage was meant to be a living wage to begin with iirc.
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That will not end up working out sadly though, as minimum wage goes up, so do prices of products and services. It will not end either unless the states or federal government put a low into place for it, but until then thats how it will go.
 
gimmepie

gimmepie

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FlameChrome said:
That will not end up working out sadly though, as minimum wage goes up, so do prices of products and services. It will not end either unless the states or federal government put a low into place for it, but until then thats how it will go.
Click to expand...

I think the point they were making is that it should be that way, and that's true. Minimum wage should be enough to cover your living expenses and that of any dependents you have. But somewhere along the line someone decided it's just the minimum they have to pay you arbitrarily and so even as prices climbs wages don't. You shouldn't have to work three jobs to feed yourself and your kids.

Thanks capitalism.
 
Nah

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I think the idea is more that, as minimum wage increases, businesses and such increase the prices on their products and services in order to compensate for this increase in cost/expenses they now have, and so we're back at square one. It's not something large corporations like Amazon or Walmart should do, as they can more than afford to not increase prices over having to pay their workers more, but it probably more makes an actual impact on small businesses.

I don't know if that's actually what happens all the time/if that's how it works though, I don't know shit about economics.
 

EnglishALT

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Nah said:
I think the idea is more that, as minimum wage increases, businesses and such increase the prices on their products and services in order to compensate for this increase in cost/expenses they now have, and so we're back at square one. It's not something large corporations like Amazon or Walmart should do, as they can more than afford to not increase prices over having to pay their workers more, but it probably more makes an actual impact on small businesses.

I don't know if that's actually what happens all the time/if that's how it works though, I don't know muk about economics.
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Interesting enough the NY Post ran an article on this very subject detailing how the minimum wage increase to $15 dollars is increasing prices in the restaurant industry.

New York City's hotly contested minimum wage increase to $15 — up from $13 or $13.50, depending on employer size — rolled out citywide at the start of the year. And although that's good news for NYC restaurant servers, patrons are grumbling about its impact on menu prices at their favorite eateries.

Ahead of the wage hike, the NYC Hospitality Alliance conducted a survey of 574 local food establishments in late 2018. They found that 87 percent of respondents planned to increase menu prices this year to offset the minimum wage bump. True to their promise, the cost of food has risen at various spots around the city.

"Basically, the prices will have gone up at every restaurant in New York," Jon Bloostein, CEO and founder of Manhattan chain Heartland Brewery, tells The Post. At his Midtown beer-and-burger joints, he says he's now charging a dollar more for several entrees, 50 cents to a dollar more on appetizers and 50 cents more on pints of beer as a direct result of the wage shift. The changes will be even more dramatic at high-end spots, he adds: "At a tablecloth restaurant, a chicken dinner with a vegetable and a side [used to go] for $26 to $28, and now it's $32 to $34," he says, giving general estimates.
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https://nypost.com/2019/01/29/nycs-minimum-wage-increase-will-give-your-takeout-sticker-shock/
 
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