In Kerry Cavanaugh’s article, “Raise the Minimum Wage, but Don’t Forget About the Cost of Housing” explains why housing is so expensive and why many people cannot afford a house due to the low minimum wage. Cavanaugh, states a few reasons why the minimum wage should go up for and what would happen if the minimum wage is being raised. According to Mark Boster, the researcher author stated, “Raising wages without building more housing increases demand without adjusting supply and could push up rents”. Boster’s way of transitioning that nothing is balanced if the minimum wage is being raised and don’t build more houses for people to live in then the rent will go up as The minimum wage should be raise because housing prices are high then why not let the minimum wage go up too so people wouldn’t have problem with money, the workers who earns Figueroa 2 $9.00 a per hour barely have the money because they have to pay housing and to be in need of saving some money for their personal needs as well. According to the Los Angeles housing is so expensive; I completely agree with that, the minimum wage should be raised because it would be beneficial for people to afford the housing. How could people afford the expensive houses if they earn the low minimum wage? Our minimum wage is nine dollars per hour In this article, Christopher Thornberg, an economist, said that “Mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti’s proposal to rise from $9.00 to $13.25, and his goal to build more 100,000 new affordable housings by 2021” but Thornberg stated that his proposal doesn’t make sense. For me, if the Mayor does that it would change people’s living in Los Angeles and help out people who are earning the higher minimum wage because they are able to afford everything for example, the rent, personal needs, bills, and support their families so they don’t have to worry about money but if the minimum wage goes up which means everything else would go up
The current minimum wage right now in California is $9.00 per hour. The question is, will this be enough for people to pay off their rent and still able to not keep their fridge empty. In the book, "Nickel and Dimed" by Barbara Ehrenreich talks about working as a low wage worker. Barbara describes the environment of the jobs that she had done in a detailed manner. She also explained how most of her coworkers lived with more than one person in order to pay rent. One of her job was working in a nursing home which she got a really low pay to take care of elderly people. In addition to that job, she had another job in order to pay off her rent. Therefore, according to the book an individual may need more than one job or live in a house with more
The United States minimum wage is not indexed to inflation. Due to this fact, the purchasing power of minimum wage falls as the price of consumer goods increases. The current hourly minimum wage is set at $7.25, however many states do pay above this rate. One example of this is in Michigan, the current hourly minimum wage is $7.40. The last time a change occurred to raise minimum wage was in 2009. President Obama has put out a proposal that is designed to raise the federally required hourly minimum wage to $10.10 in 2015. The public opinion of this proposal is all over the board ranging from a positive outlook to a negative one. Some of the negative remarks are that it would dampen the economy and shrink the hiring done by small businesses. “The Household Survival Budget for the average New Jersey family of four is $58,500 and for a single adult is $25,368 in 2010. These numbers highl...
Well, raising the minimum wage has both the pros and cons. Still, the fact that increasing the minimum wage nationwide would increase millions of workers’ earnings is deniable. I suppose that’s why some people advocate raising the minimum wage will grow the economy for everyone. In 2014, the president of the United States, Obama, called on the current Congress to raise the national minimum wage, which proves that Obama actually supports raising the minimum wage. ‘February 2014 Congressional Budget Office Report The Effects of a Minimum-Wage Increase on Employment and Family Income is the latest attempt to do so, in this response to Members of Congress with respect to an increase in the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 per hour.’
Should we have the minimum wage rise? Nowadays, many people argue that we should increase the minimum wage because we haven’t had an increase since 2009. People who are living on the minimum wage struggle a lot raising their families. (Webster) Minimum wage means the lowest daily or monthly remuneration that employers may legally pay to workers. On the other hand living wage means the minimum amount that a worker must earn to afford his/her basic necessities, without public or private assistance
As stated by Richard F. Burns and Thomas G. Vaccaro in Unaffordable Housing: A Root Cause of Social Inequality, 80% to 120% of area median income—also struggle to find affordable rental units in all 50 states. This lack of “workforce housing” results in their inability to live in or near the places where they work. Not being able to live near work if results in higher cost of living because you end up having to pay for either a car or, you could rely on public transportation or even have to pay forward gas money to another person. Housing also ties(“is also tied to”) to cost of living which turns out is very expensive. According to DePersio, Greg in "How Much Money Do You Need to Live in Los Angeles?, As of August 2015, the average rent in Los Angeles is $2,296 per month. Even if someone is only looking for a one-bedroom apartment, the average cost sits at approximately$1,950 per month. A two-bedroom apartment averages slightly over $2,500. So as one can see that they have to make at the very least $13 an hour just to pay rent, this does not even include food or utilities let alone if they have kids forget it. Because of unaffordable housing has left millions without homes making them fall under the category of
Imagine a world where you are working overtime, seven days a week, yet your kids are starving. You can’t get the education you need because you don’t have the time and money to afford it, and you can’t change jobs because this is the only one you can get. Unfortunately, this is the reality for millions of Americans living today. The federal minimum wage is too low to help families, and actually mathematically speaking, too low to survive on. The quality of life for minimum wage families is terribly low, and that is unacceptable. As humans, we should be looking after others and helping the poverty come out of their continuous cycle. Raising the minimum wage would not only help families be able to afford a better quality of life, but help them to afford healthy food, get an adequate education, and invest in the necessary health care they need.
Minimum wage is a difficult number to decide on because it affects different income earning citizens in different ways. According to Principles of Microeconomics, by N. Gregory Mankiw, minimum wage is a law that establishes the lowest price for labor that and employer may pay (Mankiw 6-1b). Currently, the minimum wage in the United States is $7.25 per hour. For many years politicians and citizens have argued on what should be the minimum wage that would benefit the economy and society in general. A minimum wage was first established in 1938 to increase the standard of living of lower class workers. To discuss what is better for the country and its citizens, people have to understand what is a minimum wage and what are its effects.
Over the years the cost of living has been on the rise. Therefore, it is only right for minimum wage to increase as the cost of living increases. Many states and even some individual cities have taken the first steps toward raising the minimum wage. States like Washington and cities like San Francisco have already raised their minimum wage above the federal minimum wage. This is a very good start as it is becoming harder and harder for Americans to start and take care of their families. We need more states and cities to follow their lead some more Americans can feel more financially stable. This will make a better America for us all.
The minimum wage today has a lot of issues; some people say it is not enough to live comfortably. Many agree that there needs to be an increase in minimum wages and by doing that it can help with our issues of poverty. Statistics show that a worker who is full time and earning minimum wage makes only $15,080 a year, which is under the federal poverty line for a family of two. (Gitis, 2013) The problem with that is $15,080 is not a sufficient amount that a person can live and grow on. “A family of two can consist of a mother and son or daughter, father and son or ...
On April 4, 2016, California Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill that would significantly raise the minimum wage for California workers. By 2022, California 's workers will receive a minimum wage of $15 per hour (Kurzweil, Anthony, Sara Welch, and Kareen Wynter). Brown signed this bill because employees cannot live above the poverty line if their minimum wage is not proportional to the cost of living (Scheiber, Noam, and Ian Lovett). The purpose of the minimum wage is to ensure that workers can provide essential amenities for themselves and their families. Many economists have been in a debate about this topic with mixed feelings, whether increasing the minimum wage would be a reasonable legislation or not. For most average American workers, at first, the idea of raising their salaries might make them feel thrilled and optimistic. However, increasing the minimum wage will have its pros and cons effect on the economy. Despite numerous of arguments from both sides, a compromise can be met regarding minimum wage.
Raising the minimum will end up hurting Americans more than helping them. The people that are for raising minimum wage are people who believe that increasing minimum wage can help those people who are unskilled and need an income they can live on. Yet, raising minimum wage would do the opposite and make employers have to fire people who earn minimum wage, because they can't afford the higher wages. People need to realize that increasing the minimum wage would hurt people more than help them. In the end increasing minimum wage would result in some people being let go, for the reason, businesses can't afford paying them minimum wage anymore.
It is very difficult to live in America if you are living off of minimum wage, and many Americans are living off of it today. Raising minimum wages has its benefits like gaining more money to live better, but people do not see the down side of the increases in wages. With the increase in minimum wage, it also causes the cost of living to increase. How can this help the economy or help people? Minimum wages in America should not be increased because it will cause cost of living to increase, reduce employment, and cause businesses to lose money and workers.
In America, low wage workers are experiencing difficulty maintaining a roof over their heads, putting food in their mouths, and providing for their families (Briana, 2016). Many of these workers are working at least two or three-part time jobs, or working full time at low-wage paying jobs. However, working fulltime or having two or three part-time jobs, still isn’t enough
A person working at minimum wage will only make about $10,700 a year. When rent, groceries, bills and gas are all added up, it appears to be a nearly impossible task to keep a family afloat. But working 40 hours a week at $5.15 an hour, one makes less than $206 a week after taxes. Making $206/week, one brings home about $824/month. Adding 17 gallons of gas at $2.20 a gallon in a car; the cost ends up to be about $38 a week, $152/month. The gas and electricity bill about $120, $50 for cable, $147 for property taxes, $45 for the telephone bill, $25 for water, and $42 for house insurance. All this totals about $580 (Abrams, H). Making it difficult to afford cable, and make the smallest payment possible on all the bills causing one to slip into debt. This is reality for many of the people in the United States. At the current minimum wage level, a full time, year round minimum wage worker in 2005 will earn $5,378 less than the $16,090 needed to lift a family of three out of poverty (Minimum).
On an average, a worker must make $18.92 per hour to afford a two-bedroom apartment in most places in the United States today (Network, Jolie Lee/USA Today). Additionally, most of the workers have to balance multiple job schedules, travel, and struggle to keep up their life going. In fact, according to the most recent available numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, (2010 Census) in December of 2011 more than 7 million people were holding 2 or more jobs. “In this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Benjamin Franklin (1789). In brief, people work and dies to pay the circle of education, work and taxes. The increase in minimum wage will indeed decrease a huge stone of stress of working enormous hours. The federal poverty line guideline for a family of four is 24,250 according to 2015 census. (Obamacarefact). Accordingly, a person will have to work 50 hours a week in order to fulfill the guideline. Whereby, $15 an hour will perfectly meet 40 hours work law without overtime or working multiple