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Comment by ptmcc | Hacker News Reader

Many (most) minimum wage jobs do not provide any meaningful benefits, so it's tangential to the minimum wage in most cases.

There's no doubt some fuzzy math involved to extrapolate inflation over the course of 50+ years, but I don't think that invalidates the fact that minimum wage has objectively not kept up with inflation even remotely.

The federal minimum wage has been stuck at $7.25 since 2009, and a handful of states are only just now breaching $15/hr. At this rate by the time a federal increase happens we'll already be another 20 years behind.

Worse yet is that labor data shows that more and more adults are working in minimum wage jobs, so the talking point of "it's just summer jobs for teenagers" and "it's entry level work to move on from" is very out of touch with reality these days. There are millions of people trying to survive on these wage levels and without benefits and it is not working.

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> The federal minimum wage has been stuck at $7.25 since 2009, and a handful of states are only just now breaching $15/hr. At this rate by the time a federal increase happens we'll already be another 20 years behind.

But even more localities have higher minimum wages. Because the "minimum necessary" is extremely cost-of-living specific, it's decentralized.

Despite Washington having a State minimum wage of $13.50, Seattle's minimum wage is $16.39/hr.

Despite New York having a State minimum wage of $11.80, New York City's minimum wage is $15/hr

Despite Illinois having a State minimum wage of $11, Chicago's minimum wage is $14/hr.

Despite California having a State minimum wage of $13, San Francisco and Berkeley's minimum wages are $16.07/hr. Emeryville's minimum wage is $16.84/hr. San Jose, Santa Clara, Cupertino, Sunnyvale, Fremont, Belmont, Alameda, El Cerrito, Los Altos, Milpitas, Redwood City, Palo Alto, Richmond, Malibu, Los Angeles, Santa Monica, and Santa Rosa all have minimum wages at or higher than $15/hr.

You can view it by state and by city here -> https://www.epi.org/minimum-wage-tracker/

Insofar as the article is talking about minimum wage workers specifically, it makes even less sense. Has the productivity of minimum wage workers gone up at the same rate as for all workers? The chart is comparing apples and oranges.

> Worse yet is that labor data shows that more and more adults are working in minimum wage jobs, so the talking point of "it's just summer jobs for teenagers" and "it's entry level work to move on from" is very out of touch with reality these days. There are millions of people trying to survive on these wage levels and without benefits and it is not working.

Then is it really true that productivity has increased? Millionaires and billionaires are not eating the food of millions of people or occupying hundreds of thousands of apartments and vehicles.

> Many (most) minimum wage jobs do not provide any meaningful benefits, so it's tangential to the minimum wage in most cases.

I think you might be forgetting that most benefits at that wage level come from the government not the employer.

When you count how those benefits have increased since 1968 then minimum wage has never been higher.

This is most particularly true for Medicaid Expandion states since the ACA, but even non-expansion states with the health care tax credits and cost sharing reductions which are worth $10k-$20k per year to a low-income family of four.

This adds about $4/hour to the effective wage of a dual-income family which TFA is just ignoring.

The increasing value and accessibility of SNAP benefits is probably another $1/hour.

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