What exactly is a "Living wage"?

[Owen Lucas]

Peter Schiff thinks the minimum wage should be $0/hr and others in the media think it should be way above $20+. Bottom line is skill + scarcity = amount of pay.

If you don't improve your skill set, then settle for public assistance and lower standards of living. It's actually not hard to get $20 an hr driving a fork lift or construction, pretty easy for most.

Where do we draw the line? Pick up 1 piece of trash on the street and ask $100/hr or build a server from scratch for $100hr?

Either way I don't care because I bring value to my work and I'm paid for appropriately. When I delivered news papers as a kid I was paid below minimum wage, probably illegal, my pay was based on how much I could collect from my route, I was happy though. Those that didn't pay had their newspaper delivered onto their roof and those that tipped me got 2. Had I known Hyundai was hiring kids to run sheet metal presses I would have driven my 10 speed to Alabama, but I digress.

In the Star Trek universe, money has been mostly eliminated because there is no more scarcity of food and materials because of replicators. One advances at work and society by their motivation and skill set. Picard didn't become a captain because he could serve a good drink on ten forward. This is why Data advanced because he was very smart. Dummies end up cleaning the holodeck and the smart people are commanding intergalactic flagships. Same thing here on Earth, you can serve people at a movie theater or design airborne lasers, one is worth more than the other.

 

[Lubener]

Being able to buy bunk and beans with a roof over your head.

 

[Hall]

Living wage to me is ability to afford food, shelter and clothing

Does that mean buying fresh meats like chicken, pork chops, etc or bags of frozen burger patties ? Living in a studio apartment or a house with bedrooms ? You don't have to answer this, it's just playing along with what I said above, like what is "comfortable".

 

[SevenBizzos]

Yeah, it's a very subjective word. Can vary from place to place. I'm not going to even consider a part time job eligible for the "living wage" discussion.

We have a local theater that just opened. Most of the kids there (because that's who's working there) were hired at $16/hr with free viewing, food, and discounted tickets for F&F. That's a pretty solid PT job if you ask me. (But you didn't )

 

[doitmyself]

The Investopedia definition and discussion of living wage is pretty good. Their definition uses the words "adequate" and "above poverty level" regarding basic necessities to remove a bit of the subjectivity. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/living_wage.asp

 

[PandaBear]

This is strickly my own personal standard, as a landlord renting apartment out to working class people at 2 bed 2 bath with a parking for $2250 (about $200 below market because I'm picky) in a blue collar neighborhood with lowish medium to bad schools:

To avoid people with bad credit and dead beat, I typically expect them to make about 4-5x rent per family. These days I'm looking for a combined income of about 80k to rent the 2250 apartment.

So, if you are just taking tickets in a "semi skilled job" supporting a daughter as a single mom, you will not qualify for my apartment. If you and your partner are both working minimum wage raising an infant daughter, you probably will also not qualify for my apartment. If you and your partners are both working "semi-skilled" and make about 55k each, and have 2 kids, good credit (say 770), no criminal records, I'd love to rent to you.

I don't know about the ticket taker's wage or even a restaurant waiter's wage, but if they have kids and they are working that job as a single parent they are likely not going to make it. The young people today know the numbers, and wouldn't waste time "making money from part time job" like these to "move out of parents' basement" and "support themselves through college" by "working". This is a negative number game and they know this. Only rich kids can afford to do part time job during school now, the poor one should finish school with a real degree asap so they can start paying off their student loans, and try their best to minimize them, or don't even bother going to college for a nonsense degree.

 

[PandaBear]

Oh, in case you think raising minimum wage is the solution: it probably isn't.

There are always a way for humanity to automate stuff away and as long as someone is making money there will always be incentive to automate those jobs away and not pay them even minimum wage. If you ever went to McDonald's lately you would have seen how many things they don't even cook in the kitchen anymore, just microwave frozen factory stuff and now they don't even have more than 1 cashier at a time, you are ordering with an app or a kiosk, parking at the spot waiting for them to take it out to you.

When was the last time you talk to a travel agent to book a hotel or a plane ticket?

When was the last time you talk to a shoe salesman?

The only solution to this problem is to focus on having fewer children and prepare them to the top, so they don't get automated before the other kids from families with too many kids and not enough money. The only child from a lower middle class will have a better chance of survival than the 2 children from the same kind of family.

 

[JeffKeryk]

There is no fair. If you are looking for it or expect it, I wish you luck.
Actually, I wish you luck regardless.

 

[JTK]

Heck I can’t either! That’s more than my mortgage and utilities!

It's more than my mortgage (taxes and homeowners insurance included), with utilities and car insurance added on top of that!

 

[Wolf359]

Tell me you never worked in IT without telling me you never worked in IT and that you you are 50+ There is a whole separate world where multiple roles are customer facing and deal with pos people all day, every day. Software delevopers, yes they do not do any physical work, but very often it is hard mental work that requires multiple years of education, constant education by learning new technologies, languages and getting new certifications (which are not free also in monetary and time terms). This is why the are paid top dollar, so you can click couple of buttons and rant about it while sitting on your couch (that is sarcasm)

Oh yeah, you need good people skills.

 

[Wolf359]

This is strickly my own personal standard, as a landlord renting apartment out to working class people at 2 bed 2 bath with a parking for $2250 (about $200 below market because I'm picky) in a blue collar neighborhood with lowish medium to bad schools:

To avoid people with bad credit and dead beat, I typically expect them to make about 4-5x rent per family. These days I'm looking for a combined income of about 80k to rent the 2250 apartment.

So, if you are just taking tickets in a "semi skilled job" supporting a daughter as a single mom, you will not qualify for my apartment. If you and your partner are both working minimum wage raising an infant daughter, you probably will also not qualify for my apartment. If you and your partners are both working "semi-skilled" and make about 55k each, and have 2 kids, good credit (say 770), no criminal records, I'd love to rent to you.

I don't know about the ticket taker's wage or even a restaurant waiter's wage, but if they have kids and they are working that job as a single parent they are likely not going to make it. The young people today know the numbers, and wouldn't waste time "making money from part time job" like these to "move out of parents' basement" and "support themselves through college" by "working". This is a negative number game and they know this. Only rich kids can afford to do part time job during school now, the poor one should finish school with a real degree asap so they can start paying off their student loans, and try their best to minimize them, or don't even bother going to college for a nonsense degree.

I think you're a bit off on your numbers. The federal government uses 30% so you can't be accused of discrimination if you use 30% which is a safe number. 4-5x rent is more like 20-25% which basically says you're only renting to rich people. You can also include utilities in the calculation. But let's say you don't, $2250 works out to a 90k annual income to hit the 30% mark. It's 108k for the 4x mark and 135k for 5x income. For me, the real metric of whether they can pay is what they have in their bank account, those that have 10k+ or more are fine, those that don't have any savings, I kinda pass on.

As for credit scores, anything below 620 is subprime. I also read the actual report to see if there are any late payments, a very key indicator. Typically though, you encounter scores anywhere between 650-750 with around 700 or so being an average type score but occasionally you run into people that have 800+ scores, somewhat rare though. Credit checks cost me $24 these days for all three credit bureaus, I think they were just $10-$12 like 10-15 years ago.

 

[PWMDMD]

$350-400K? It's all relative.

 

[PandaBear]

I think you're a bit off on your numbers. The federal government uses 30% so you can't be accused of discrimination if you use 30% which is a safe number. 4-5x rent is more like 20-25% which basically says you're only renting to rich people. You can also include utilities in the calculation. But let's say you don't, $2250 works out to a 90k annual income to hit the 30% mark. It's 108k for the 4x mark and 135k for 5x income. For me, the real metric of whether they can pay is what they have in their bank account, those that have 10k+ or more are fine, those that don't have any savings, I kinda pass on.

As for credit scores, anything below 620 is subprime. I also read the actual report to see if there are any late payments, a very key indicator. Typically though, you encounter scores anywhere between 650-750 with around 700 or so being an average type score but occasionally you run into people that have 800+ scores, somewhat rare though. Credit checks cost me $24 these days for all three credit bureaus, I think they were just $10-$12 like 10-15 years ago.

I wasn't that strict on the cutoff (was thinking after tax income). One thing to remember is that if you work any stable job (full time, 8 hrs a day) you would likely make at least 55-60k here. Am I discriminating against poor people? I would say I am protecting myself as the eviction law is pretty unfair these days (there's a backlog of 6 months on eviction last I heard), and if I see you are a discipline and responsible person (like you say with some savings in the bank, at least 650 credit, no criminal record), you are "considered". I don't think you can use "federal" as a way to calculate the number here as we do have like 10% state income tax, and my apartment have common water, hot water, and garbage, so that saves you probably another 50 already. Typically I do have multiple 90k+ applicant family / roommates and often some 135 ones as well. Too high of an income is also not stable as they save up very fast for downpayment for a home, I'd say the sweet spot so far for that building is about 95-105, dual income, family of 3-4, credit score between 680-720.

Super high income and high credit people can also be trouble, there are lots of Karen in that crowd. And before you ask, ethnic group or which job they do isn't the best indicator either. I've had some horrible government employees and some very honest construction workers in the past.

Only problem with section 8 is that despite the people can be good (just low income but honest) the agency take their sweet time planning on the inspection and then artificially dock your asking rent because "the market is down" and they don't consider water / parking / condition / sqft / school district as the premium. Sometimes you rent to a sect 8, signed an agreement, then 1 month later you are told to deduct $200 or else it is no go. You just wasted 1 month unpaid of stupidity and then if you don't play along (say you aren't even accepting applications) they say you are discriminating poor people and fine you $50k. So now I am doing that slightly lower rent so I don't have to deal with this, unless it is at the beginning of a downturn and I have no choice but to rent to sect 8. Maybe one day when I mismanage a building into a below average dump I'll just focus on abusing the sect 8 system and accept "average" rent for below average condition. I know many landlord do this but I can't bring myself to mismanage a building if I can do things right the first time.

 

[ecotourist]

When I started work (1966) I dreamed of making $300 a month. That would have paid for my room and board with a little left over for fun. My first job paid $135 a month, but to be fair, it was a trainee position.

In those days, young people could not afford an apartment. We all lived in "room and board" (meaning we had our own bedroom, the homeowner usually did our laundry, and we ate with the family). Cell phones had not been invented. My biggest luxury was that I had a nice radio. A $20 bill paid for a quality weekend (take a friend to a movie or dance and buy a couple of glasses of beer).

The problem with the "living wage" concept is that expectations keep rising.

We think we're well off because, as retirees, we can afford (meaning we have paid for) a nice 2500 square foot house in a nice area and we can buy pretty much whatever we want. We have no debts. We don't worry about money. We don't eat out much (hardly ever to be honest) because my wife is a better cook than most chefs. I don't have a cellphone because I don't want one. My wife has an older model basic Samsung with a basic data plan. I buy a new car every 15 - 20 years. Many people would probably say we have a basic living (barely). We think we're well off. It all depends on what you expect.

 

[Wolf359]

Only problem with section 8 is that despite the people can be good (just low income but honest) the agency take their sweet time planning on the inspection and then artificially dock your asking rent because "the market is down" and they don't consider water / parking / condition / sqft / school district as the premium. Sometimes you rent to a sect 8, signed an agreement, then 1 month later you are told to deduct $200 or else it is no go. You just wasted 1 month unpaid of stupidity and then if you don't play along they say you are discriminating poor people. So now I am doing that slightly lower rent so I don't have to deal with this, unless it is at the beginning of a downturn and I have no choice but to rent to sect 8. Maybe one day when I mismanage a building into a below average dump I'll just focus on abusing the sect 8 system and accept "average" rent for below average condition. I know many landlord do this but I can't bring myself to mismanage a building if I can do things right the first time.

I remember one broker asking me if I knew anyone that specialized in Section 8 and I told him that was like specializing in failure. They do pull the changing the rent amount trick, but normally you submit the paperwork and then within a week or so they tell you what rent amount is approved and if you don't like it, you can just drop them. They never say anything about discriminating or anything like that.

I've had section 8 tenants in the past and some of them used to complain a lot. Sometimes they were just home a lot so had lots of time on their hands to complain. I would tell people it's because they want to make sure the government gets their money's worth. For me section 8 was middle of the road, I've had worse tenants where I've had to evict about a dozen plus over the last few years, every one of them cost me several thousand in lost rent, repair costs, etc, worst was probably 6-8k, empty a few months, a few months of unpaid rent and a few thousand in damages to the apartment. At least the section 8 tenants paid the rent and I never actually had to evict a section 8 tenant although I've had to spend a few hundred here and there to fix the place up afterwards but then you're in the grey zone of wear and tear. A couple times they left the place a mess and I called them to tell them it wasn't like that when they got it and I'd hate to call section 8 and have them lose their voucher so they came back and cleaned the place up.

 

[PandaBear]

So back to "what is a living wage". I'd say in my area if you are single probably about 80k, and if you have a family of 4 then it would be about 100k, based on the math I give out earlier for the rent number in industrial Hayward, CA.

Will living in Oakland, CA with regular drive by shooting be the benchmark of "living wage"? Well that depends on what you want to do with the number. If someone want to pay me only enough to live there and if I don't, I'll be considered an irresponsible adult and loafing off the government, I'd not take that job and that employer deserved to be out of staff.

Yeah, my standard of living wage, means blue collar neighborhood with reasonable crime rate / safety for 2 working adults in a family of 4.

 

[PWMDMD]

So back to "what is a living wage". I'd say in my area if you are single probably about 80k, and if you have a family of 4 then it would be about 100k, based on the math I give out earlier for the rent number in industrial Hayward, CA.

Will living in Oakland, CA with regular drive by shooting be the benchmark of "living wage"? Well that depends on what you want to do with the number. If someone want to pay me only enough to live there and if I don't, I'll be considered an irresponsible adult and loafing off the government, I'd not take that job and that employer deserved to be out of staff.

Yeah, my standard of living wage, means blue collar neighborhood with reasonable crime rate / safety for 2 working adults in a family of 4.

Two kids will only add $20K per year? If I could live on $80K as a single person each kid adds at least $25K per year between college, food, clothing, increased housing requirements, insurance, etc.

 

[PandaBear]

Two kids will only add $20K per year? If I could live on $80K as a single person each kid adds at least $25K per year between college, food, clothing, increased housing requirements, insurance, etc.

Living wage can't afford college, or entitle you to 1 room per children.

Comfortable wage is not the same as living (survival) wage.

 

[Andrew1972]

Living wage cover basics like utilities , food, housing and transportation(public or inexpensive vehicle rurally).

That costs differs wildly by area/region. If you have someone working at Movie Theater on Nantucket then guessing a living wage is $20-$25/hr and barely making it.

 

[Andrew1972]

But just about anyone is skilled enough to take tickets. Not nearly as many skilled computer programmers. There goes that pesky law of supply and demand again, isn't anyone going to outlaw it?

Our min wage is $7.30/hr however the local wage is $12.50/hr for 14 year olds and approaching $15/hr for 16+. The reason 2% unemployment and short supply of people to fill low skill jobs as they beg and attract anyone to skilled work with free training in the $20-35/hr range.