Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

[Evad]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

right on markio26.

I have zero sympathy for people making minimum wage. They are in that position because they want to be not because they have to be.

[Ima saver]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I worked at minimum wage about all of my life, until I became a waitress, then I worked for $201 an hour.

[vsjhoc]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

Here is the breakdown per pay:

Gifts: 225 (I'm messing around with this number. I took what I expect to spend on Christmas and devided it by 5 months between now and Christmas. DH is expecting a rare windfall of $3000 in reimbursement for a recent work trip he took and he wants to use that money to cover Christmas and other things. I want to use it to pay down debt. I don't know yet.
Gas: 100
food: 200
childcare: 172
CC: 125

The grand total is $822. How do people do it? There is no room in there for a mortgage or an electric bill, etc? If I lost my job tomorrow, we couldn't do it. His salary is more than a minimum wage job and yet we have a hard time using it for just living expenses.

I feel like we are very, very fortunate and it makes me really think twice when I complain about not having enough money. It is hard to live on so little.

Please tell me I am reading this wrong: you are spending $1,125 on Christmas gifts but can't afford electricity? And if DH is getting a reimbursement, that means you have already spent the $3,000 -- presumably you charged it -- which means you are making the sensible choice to pay down that debt.

[abowers]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I was working full time, making $10.25/hr in an area with a very high cost of living an hour south of NYC... I managed to get by and have extra money, paying $415/mo in rent, $265/mo for car, $125/mo undergrad loans... not to mention cell, groceries, cable, electricity, eating out.

Now I'm currently making $8.50/hr... blah... but the university is paying for 6 credits of grad school tuition each semester (valued at $6300/year) which is a bigger benefit to me, so I can afford to go full time and finish asap. I'm still getting by on $8.50/hr... paying rent, car, cell, groceries, gas/elec/water, eating out (loans deferred because I'm taking a summer grad class, and no cable b/c we don't have to pay for cable in our new apartment).

On the side I babysit occasionally for $10-12/hr,
Plus I make & sell knitted bags (started as a hobby, now a mini business on the side... selling to friends/family/friends of friends, and have bags for sale in a nearby shop).

I never made minimum wage... I started around $6/hr at jobs during HS when min. wage was $5.15, and I got consistent raises.
Even in HS I babysat, mowed lawns, etc. to make more money.

I don't feel too bad about people making min. wage, because if you are a hard worker, you should be able to find something better than that, even if you are just a high school graduate. As an example, Barnes and Noble, Best Buy, and Home Depot all offer more than min. wage and often have regular raises, promotions, tuition remission, etc.

I am making only a little above minimum wage since graduating from college/while in grad school, with no assistance from parents, etc. and I'm doing fine living in a high cost area. You just need to figure out what you can afford.

[lrjohnson]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I have zero sympathy for people making minimum wage. They are in that position because they want to be not because they have to be.

You've got issues. It's not that simple, and if you believe it is, I suggest that you spend a large chunk of time with quite a few low income folks. Yeah, you'll find some shocking waste of money and talent. But mostly I think you'd develop some compassion as you see people do the best they can with what they have and what they know. And instead of sympathy, which is a little limited, you might develop some understanding. Be wary of judgements.

Myself, I just began day one of month 6 of voluntarily living on the CA Minimum Wage of $6.75. I blog the progess, and the hard numbers. I don't take a political stand: my opinion comes down to: people need to be paid fairly and have access to affordable healthcare, and people need to make better spending decisions and not be such consumers. It's a gray answer, kinda like most things. Not too much black and white in this world.

[Broken Arrow]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I have zero sympathy for people making minimum wage. They are in that position because they want to be not because they have to be.

You have a very strange world-view, Evad. How does the saying go, "Don't judge a person until you have walked a mile in his shoes"?

[DivaJen]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I had some friends who were libertarian and were really opposed to government 'handouts'. Interestingly enough, they had no problem accepting handout after handout and bail out after bail out from one set of wealthy parents.

Evad's comment brought that to mind... it is easy to sit in judgement when you have never and most likely will never have to face that situation. It is easy to make judgements when you yourself have an ample safety net to fall into should hard times befall you.

[Bookie]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

right on markio26.

I have zero sympathy for people making minimum wage. They are in that position because they want to be not because they have to be.

It's rude to talk with a silver spoon in your mouth.

As others have said, the plight of the minimum wage earner merits our compassion. The self-serving claim that poverty is a character failing or a personal choice does an injustice to the unfortunate while absolving the greater society of an responsibility in the matter. Blaming the victim is an ancient and dishonorable practice too contemptible to merit discussion.

The alleviation of poverty is not on the national agenda. It it were, resources would be allocated to provide education, training, child care, health services, and a social support system for those who want and can benefit from these things. The War on Poverty was lost not because victory was unattainable but because the will to win was absent.

[Kris10Leigh]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

VSJhoc, you did read it wrong. Every penny of my money goes into one bank and pays ALL of our bills. (including electricity ) Every penny of DH's money goes into another bank and we use that money to live on. My point was that even when you factor out regular bills (and I used electricity as an example), we are still short on funds. The figures I used were based souly on his salary. We have a hard time surviving on his salary for only our living expenses. I can't imagine how we'd do it if I wasn't working also.

That Christmas figure includes all gifts for everyone on my list. No, I didn't pay for his trip up front with our credit cards. But our credit cards did have less thrown at them that month. The $3000 reimursebent money was for food expenses and over time. The overtime is obviously clear and free and he chose to eat in rather than out and therefore the majority of the per diem money his free and clear too.

[Diolla]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

DS and I sat down last June and made a budget for him assuming he got a minimum wage job on graduating high school. It was just to show him why having a goal and training and/or college to get a good job was important.

Working a low wage job ($6 per hr) He had enough for a crummy apt., utilities, gas, food and car insurance (<26 yo male ouch!) No health insurance.

Gross Income 1040 p. mth
Taxes 15% 156
Rent $300
Food $200
Gas $ 80
Utilities $100
Car Insurance $85
Phone $20
Left $99

Of course these numbers are probably very optimistic and he would just be an accident waiting to happen.

[Ima saver]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

Evad, how much did you say your new car cost, wasn't it 130 to 140K?? Your parents brought it for your 22nd birthday.
I would rather have worked all my life for minimum wage and learned how to manage my money, than have it just handed to me. You are not learning anything.
When I first got married, I worked 45 hours a week for $45 , a dollar an hour. I saved my money and bought a house! No one gave me anything!!
When I moved here, there were NO jobs for women. i was glad to get a job paying minimum wage after 9 months of looking!

[Thrifty Ray]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

right on markio26.

I have zero sympathy for people making minimum wage. They are in that position because they want to be not because they have to be.

Im a little confused as to why someone claiming to be in your financial position would chose to spend his time belittling folks less fortunate than him-and on a site that is designed to help and support those folks...

[vsjhoc]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

VSJhoc, you did read it wrong. Every penny of my money goes into one bank and pays ALL of our bills. (including electricity ) Every penny of DH's money goes into another bank and we use that money to live on. My point was that even when you factor out regular bills (and I used electricity as an example), we are still short on funds. The figures I used were based souly on his salary. We have a hard time surviving on his salary for only our living expenses. I can't imagine how we'd do it if I wasn't working also.

That Christmas figure includes all gifts for everyone on my list. No, I didn't pay for his trip up front with our credit cards. But our credit cards did have less thrown at them that month. The $3000 reimursebent money was for food expenses and over time. The overtime is obviously clear and free and he chose to eat in rather than out and therefore the majority of the per diem money his free and clear too.

Thanks for clarifying, Kris. Hope things get easier for you!

[tgavin71]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

Im a little confused as to why someone claiming to be in your financial position would chose to spend his time belittling folks less fortunate than him-and on a site that is designed to help and support those folks...

I agree 150% with this quote. It seems to me that Evad believes that how much money you earn and how many possessions you own determines your value. THis is a load of crap. I know a lot of people who have very little money and limited possessions but the work they do for our schools and our local community is priceless.

[zoe]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

My parents were reasonably well-off and my husband jokes that I had a silver spoon in my mouth my whole life. I used to have little compassion for the low-paid ("they should just work harder!"). How wrong I was. THere are limitted opportunities for them to climb the ladder. They don't have the social contacts for networking. They don't have the language skills. They may have emotional issues. Lack of social skills. THey may have made mistakes in their past that keep them from being able to get that job. Lots of reasons. I don't think they would really choose to be low-paid. If they had all the opportunities we lucky ones had in life, do you really think that they would be poor? Good schools, stable family, support for college etc. As someone who now lives (temporarily until I finish my studies) on a low income because I chose to marry for love not money, sees my hubby work hard but get nowhere because he's not "academically minded" - I take offense at your comment. But you're young, maybe you'll learn. Hopefully not the hard way!