A living wage covers rent, food, healthcare, education, and transit. Period.

[u/Lord0fTheFlags]

[u/Prestigious_Net_8356]

Capitalism often creates a sense of uncertainty and fear among individuals regarding their financial stability and future, as it relies on competition and the potential for economic failure. This fear can lead to feelings of powerlessness and anxiety about personal and societal well-being, and that's how they want it. There's no time for rabble-rousing when you're afraid, and you will always be grateful for what you have, even if it's very little.

[u/AngusAlThor]

Ok, that is wrong... because it does not also include money for non-necessities. The minimum wage should be the minimum on which you can sustain a decent life, and life is not decent without art, sport, friends and frivolities.

[u/Xeno4_Biscuit → u/AngusAlThor]

A budget with zero room for hobbies, birthdays, a coffee with friends, or one unexpected expense is not stability. It is just poverty with perfect attendance.

[u/JG-at-Prime → u/Xeno4_Biscuit]

It also needs to vary regionally. Life in the big city is a lot more expensive than in a small town. 

Just rent alone can be a massive variable. 

[u/boardin1 → u/JG-at-Prime]

A federal minimum wage, tied to inflation, and local minimum wage, added to that, based on regional CPI. The issue that you’ll have is CoL in the city will be high and CoL in the rural areas will be low. So there will be issues with rural employers trying to find employees if they can make more just by driving to the nearest city. We’ll have a bit of a rough patch while that gets balanced out but it’s either going to be that or we just keep letting the wealthy take everything from us.

———————

First they took the money from the destitute, but I wasn’t destitute so I didn’t say anything.

Next they took the money from the poor, but I wasn’t poor so I didn’t say anything.

Next they took the money from the working poor, but I wasn’t working poor so I didn’t say anything.

Next they took the money from the lower middle class, but I wasn’t lower middle class so I didn’t say anything.

Next they took the money from the middle class, but I didn’t say anything because I wasn’t middle class.

Next they took the money from the upper middle class and there was no one left to save me because they were all already in the mines.

— my apologies to Paster Niemöller for what I’ve done to his beautiful poem about a horrible time in history.

[u/tallman11282]

This isn't extreme in the least and was always supposed to be what the minimum wage was for. As FDR said when signing the first minimum wage act into law:

It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country. By "business" I mean the whole of commerce as well as the whole of industry; by workers I mean all workers, the white collar class as well as the men in overalls; and by living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level-I mean the wages of decent living.

[u/not_so_subtle_now → u/tallman11282]

I'm surprised this quote isn't brought up every single time the issue of what minimum wage is "supposed to be" is discussed.

He didn't mince words. FDR knew corporations and others would try to misconstrue his words in the years that followed. He worded his speech very carefully and specifically so that there would be no doubt about what the minimum wage act was intended for.

Not for teenagers. Not as starter jobs. The minimum wage is the wage of a decent living, and any business in the US not willing to pay that does not belong here.

[u/Natural-Trip6972]

The Minimum wage Trap: Earning too little to live, but just enough to be denied a lifeline

[u/Lord0fTheFlags]

Exactly. A job should lift you up, not keep you barely alive.

[u/Little-Somewhere6076]

Agreed, workers should demand what they are worth, not rely on the government

[u/Filmtwit → u/Little-Somewhere6076]

Yep

[u/EmperorLlamaLegs]

Add in bills, gas, car payments, internet, phone, and enough extra to save and maintain/replace your belongings as they wear out...

The minimum wage should be the value that gives people a sustainable life so we dont end up with companies allowed to weaponize their greed against us until everyone is on the verge of a crisis... and it should be every job and every person. Dishwashers, waiters, janitors, fruit pickers, temp workers, even prisoners out on work programs, teenagers, etc. Every person working full time deserves at least that.

[u/PewPewLAS3RGUNs]

I feel like we should set all public sector salaries based on a factor of the minimum wage.

Police, Teachers, Firefighters, Politicians, etc.

For example, pay for an entry-level police officer or teacher starts at 1x min wage, it goes up by 0.1x every 3 years. A promotion to a supervisor role adds another 0.5x, etc.

After 10 years it's 1.3x, after 20 and a promotion it's 2.1x

And publish the factors for each so everyone can see.

If so many workers relied on the minimum wage for their salary calculation, it becomes a much harder thing to hold down or ignore.

But that's not the only problem... We also need decent and affordable public transportation, universal Healthcare and pre-kindergarden childcare, guaranteed vacation days and time off for sickness and other life events, and a social retirement plan that makes life more affordable, predictable, and stable so that workers earning the minimum wage aren't stuck with the question of whether what little money they have should be spent on food, medicine, or childcare.

The problem isn't that the minimum wage is too low, the problem is that being poor in America is a pit of despair that reinforces poverty on the most vulnerable

[u/Ok_Arachnid1089]

The people who pay those wages also get to set the minimum wage. It’s a wonderful system

[u/FanDry5374]

We need a living salary, paying someone $30 per hour is cool, but when it comes with a zero hour contract or a 20 hours per week schedule it's no help. Any business with more than one employee (the owner) should be required to pay enough for a person to live on unless the employee doesn't need(pension, other income sources) or want it (school or family obligations that preclude a full work week).

[u/uswforever]

All that plus enough extra to supportidest savings.

[u/JerseyDonut]

The only fundamental argument against this is "Fuck you, I got mine. Die for all I care its not my problem." That's it. Thats the only argument when you cut through all the bullshit.

[u/Lost-Tomatillo3465]

you forgot about retirement. I think a popular talking point amongst republican is why should we pay for retired people. Probably because there has been talking points about how ss tax should affect the top 20%.

So if that's they're talking point, they really need to pay people enough to retire off of.

[u/InevitableGoal2912]

I got downvoted for saying rent for a one bedroom apartment should be tied to the minimum wage, in that it shouldn’t be a goddamned dollar more than %25 of the minimum wage.

[u/dangerouslycute50]

the childrens education part is important

[u/This-Requirement2306]

It's not a radical or new concept. See Australia's 1907 ‘Harvester Judgement’:

https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/harvester-judgement

[u/SuckerForNoirRobots]

Change "decent" to "acceptable." Call it like it is.