America has never gone this long without hiking the federal minimum wage

Re:America has never gone this long without hiking the feder... by peterwwillis on Wednesday June 19, 2019 @04:10PM (#20226863)

Can you restate this please? It doesn't make sense; how are 2.3% of wage earners actually 58% of workers actually 78% of the adult population actually 1% of adult population?

From [1]: 1.8 million workers made the federal minimum wage or less. But that does not say how many people made less than $15 an hour, which is considered a living wage. According to the NELP in 2016, 42% of US workers make less than $15 per hour. Nearly half of US workers. [2]

So raising the minimum wage would support nearly half the US workforce to be able to, you know, live. I think setting economic policy with this in mind makes more sense than only considering what teenagers need.

[1] https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2017/home.htm [2] https://raisetheminimumwage.com/fight-for-15/

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:America has never gone this long without hiking the feder... by hodr on Tuesday June 25, 2019 @02:16PM (#20277143)

Restated: 78% of adults work. 58% of workers are "wage earners" (paid hourly, not salary) 2.3% of wage earners earn minimum wage.

Therefore 0.0230.580.78 = 0.0104, or just over 1% of adults earn minimum wage.

[ Parent | on HN ]