Hacker News Reader

Comment by systemtest | Hacker News Reader

I'm not from Norway but the Netherlands. If you have a fulltime job at McDonalds, the only way to live on that wage is with heavy subsidies from the government. You will need healthcare subsidy, rent subsidy, social housing, various municipal arrangements and perhaps even go to the "voedselbank" (food bank, free food charity).

So while you can live on a McDonalds income, it's only because your fellow citizens are chipping in. Effectively we are subsidising McDonalds as they can now give you a lower income and get away with it.

I'm not sure if that is the best way to go.

View on HN

> So while you can live on a McDonalds income, it's only because your fellow citizens are chipping in. Effectively we are subsidising McDonalds as they can now give you a lower income and get away with it.

No, before social support networks of the modern mixed economy companies paid worse for basically unskilled jobs. The surplus of people desperate for work meant that if the pay was better than no job but inadequate for survival in the long term, people would still take it, and if the inadequate pay meant they died or became unable to work, well, there were always more people in the surplus labor pool to replace them.

Decreasing the desperate need for employment puts more power in the hands of labor, not capital.

Dutch here, too. While everyone below a certain income gets benefits like healthcare subsidy you can still live okay on a McDonalds salary. If you make €10 an hour you get €1600 a month. And at that level you pay almost no income tax. While not a lot, you don't necessarily need the foodbank or other subsidies than the regular ones to make ends meet.

The parallels to the Roman Grain Dole[0] cannot be missed. The Cura Annonae warped Rome from top to bottom, from calories, to shipping, to politics, to military; nearly every aspect of Rome was touched by it. Heck, it likely outlasted Rome herself.

Those subsidies, like the current ones, run deep.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cura_Annonae#Politics_and_the_...

Just 5 years ago, I would've considered 1600 Euros or the pound equivalent a month to be plenty of money. At the time, I was a student living in the UK. Some years earlier still, whilst back in my native baltic state, that kind of a monthly income would seem super comfortable.

The biggest difference is that housing is a lot more expensive in western cities - it is likely that even a modest 2-room (1-bedroom) apartment in a major city like Amsterdam would cost the majority of that wage to rent (and we're not talking about just students, but older people who can't get better jobs).

You say it like you just grabbed a random example, but Amsterdam is one of the most expensive places to rent in NL. It's also generally not at all representative for the Netherlands as a whole.

Ok, you may replace it with London, Paris, Zürich, Munich, Copenhagen, Stockholm and probably a dozen other western european cities (not to mention major American cities, which are sometimes even more extreme).

Rent is the main problem. We are not subsidising McDonalds, we are subsidising landlords. If rent price would stay the same, the minimum wage job wouldn't need subsidies from the state.

The problem is that all powerful people own properties and they want to keep prices high. Main voters base also owns properties. It's an unsolvable problem.

> Rent is the main problem

London. The problem is the same in all large cities/capitals. I was listening on a BBC podcast a couple of years back discussing how the "not living where they work" is the main thing holding them back in progressing with their lives as much/fast as they could.

Especially in London, where near the center you can't get a decent studio for less than 1000-1300 pounds per month (just the rent now add council tax, utilities, etc.). The only way to make it is live on a flat with 3-5-7 more people.

There are some "maps vs rent" for London. I assume you can find some for other cities as well.

https://d36tnp772eyphs.cloudfront.net/blogs/1/2018/05/london...

https://static.homesandproperty.co.uk/s3fs-public/thumbnails...

https://www.thrillist.com/lifestyle/london/london-undergroun...

If you see prices below 1k, it's per week.

Dutchie in NYC here. Dude(ette), I hear you, things aren't perfect back home. But frankly, you have no idea how much better things are for the low age earners in the Netherlands compared to the US. Working at a FAANG company here in NYC, you get 200-400k/year, and you use that money to pay thousands of dollars to live in a nice area in a building without rats and cockroaches and with proper sound proofing, which qualifies as luxury here.

And then you go to stand in line at the local wholefoods to buy $2.5 local chocolate croissants and $2 kombuchas from a teller who earns $15/hour.

Tip well, my friends, tip well.

I checked and in Sweden a low level employee in McDonalds would earn 21930 sek (2300 dollars), or 17593 sek after taxes, which might be just enough to live from if you live outside of big cities.

This is the same problem in America. The corporations already get tax breaks and subsidies, but then they underpay their employees to make the taxpayers subsidize an effectively living wage by providing welfare. It's not the employee's fault, but communities and employees could organize and press for living wages in order for the corporation to pay a living wage.

It's the same in the U.S. except you have to qualify and jump through a bunch of hoops to get assistance. And the pay is shit that you can't live off of.

i.e. in the u.s. you get fucked from both ends.

Second that for Germany (though we are well known for our low-wage-sector allowing us to export a lot for a developed country). In addition a good lot of people working there are kids, which (like in most services) is quite an unfair competition for people having to earn their living wage with those jobs...

It's a bit odd to think that fast food is indirectly sustained through national funding.

One tiny benefit of these kind of jobs, if you ever need something to do to earn money, they'll most probably hire you.

But it's not a great thing.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com