However, this catch-all category covers many things that most workers would probably consider essential. This category even includes basic household items and personal care products, such as cleaning supplies, shampoo, soap, and even toilet paper — a must-have if ever there were one.
These miscellaneous expenses fall under several categories in the CEX survey. To make ends meet, Kai will have to find ways to cut way, way down on all these expenses. Unfortunately, this is pretty much impossible for Kai. The inability to save is a particularly big problem if Kai has any existing debts, such as student loans or credit card debt.
Unfortunately, many low-wage workers are in this situation. For married couples or others who share a household, it can be somewhat easier. Even if both partners make minimum wage, two people sharing household expenses can typically live on less money than one living alone, so these couples are likely to have more wiggle room in their budgets. However, this benefit vanishes for couples who are raising children together. They must either sacrifice one income so one parent can stay home with the kids or pay for child care , which could potentially eat up an entire minimum wage salary by itself.
But we also know that in reality, there are around 1. Many of the minimum wage workers interviewed by news sources rely on some form of government aid. Numerous workers say either they or their family members rely on SNAP, and one woman receives housing aid as well. Nearly all minimum wage workers interviewed by news sources are financially dependent on friends or family members. Workers in the Los Angeles Times article say they rely on relatives and friends for child care, baby supplies, and help with bills.
Both Vice and the Los Angeles Times say many workers hold multiple jobs at once to make ends meet. For instance, one man works as both a janitor and a fast-food worker, putting in around 60 hours a week in total. According to the BLS , 4. Other minimum wage workers earn extra money from a variety of odd jobs. Interviewees mention delivering food for Grubhub and DoorDash , taking part in paid medical studies , or donating plasma.
Some consistently work 50 hours or more per week, while others never know from day to day what their working hours will be. Some spend hours each day commuting on public transport, forcing them to get up as early as 5am to make it to work on time.
A single mother says she often has to choose between taking her kids to see a doctor and working to earn the money she needs to support them. Minimum wage jobs are often physically demanding as well. One worker describes spending eight- to hour shifts at a grocery store constantly on her feet, running back and forth between the cash register and the stockroom.
Vox also talked to a Walmart worker in Arkansas who says she puts off paying bills in order to buy food for herself and her family. Other workers describe having their utilities cut off, being evicted for unpaid rent, and even being homeless. These days, the difficulties of living on minimum wage are attracting a lot of attention from business and government leaders. However, Republicans say this could result in job losses that would actually leave low-wage workers worse off.
However, paying for this plan would require either higher taxes on well-to-do workers or significant cuts in social programs. Since most of the working poor now rely on those same programs to get by, this change could leave them no better off than they are now.
Under this plan, all Americans, regardless of how much they make, would receive a check each month for enough money to cover basic necessities. Your child's birthday or due date. Girl Boy Other Not Sure. Add A Child. Something went wrong. Please contact support fatherly. Like fatherly on Facebook. Something went wrong please contact us at support fatherly.
These are people trying to live. No one can. No one can live on that as an individual, much less someone supporting a family. I wasn't supporting anyone, not even myself. And beyond helping our nation's lowest-paid workers pay their rent and put food on the table, raising the minimum wage would also be a big boost to the economy. There are many studies I could cite here to explain this, but I'm not going to , because they're not needed.
This is a straightforward, simple and rational argument. You don't have a savings account, you aren't remodeling your kitchen and you're not investing in the stock market. Every dollar you're making is going into the economy -- toward things like rent, food and clothes.
If these workers get a little more money in their pocket they're going to spend it. All of it. And that money will have a ripple effect throughout the economy this is known by economists as the multiplier effect -- unlike, say, tax cuts for the nation's wealthiest. You think they're buying more food or a winter coat for their kid with their extra money? They have more than they need and will simply take this extra money and remove it from the economy by stashing it away in the Cayman Islands or gambling it in the stock market.
And there's been a big problem in this country since , which has played a large part in the raging gap between the rich and the poor since that time. Others say that raising the minimum wage would hurt employment, but that's not really the case either.
Last year House Speaker John Boehner said , "When you raise the price of employment, guess what happens? You get less of it," but the data is not there to back up the speaker's talking point. According to a study by the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business, leading economists agree by a nearly four-to-one margin that the positives of raising the federal minimum wage outweigh the negatives.
Will prices increase if we raise the minimum wage?
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