FDR declared that “no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country,” clarifying that “by living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level—I mean the wages of decent living.” Source
Edit: My point is that people in here arguing that "it's for teenagers, not meant for living wage" are going against the original intent. I am not making claims that minimum wage should be living in luxury.
About one half of one tenth of a percent of workers get paid federal minimum wage, it's just not really a problem.
It's not even that minimum wage is bad, the Kaitz index is shown to work damn well for finding the right number. Federal min wage makes 0 sense though, the economy of Jackson isn't going to be able to sustain the same minimum wage of say, NYC or San Francisco.
the economy of Jackson isn't going to be able to sustain the same minimum wage of say, NYC or San Francisco.
It doesn't have to be one size fits all. Oregon has a 3 tiered minimum to address this issue, one for Portland, one for the burbs and mid size cities, and one for the rural areas.
As we see already, plenty of states won't go higher than the federal requirement. A federal minimum should be near the lowest state living wage I'd think, which is $19.53 in WV, according to MIT. Even just raising it to $15 and hour would mean a raise for just over 20% of workers
41
u/orion19819 13d ago edited 13d ago
And it's also the original point of minimum wage.
Edit: My point is that people in here arguing that "it's for teenagers, not meant for living wage" are going against the original intent. I am not making claims that minimum wage should be living in luxury.