

McDonalds’ suggested budget for employees shows how impossible it is to get by - boh
http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/202172/mcdonalds-suggested-budget-for-employees-shows-just-how-impossible-it-is-to-get-by-on-minimum-wage/

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minikites
Minimum wage has not tracked productivity. People who must rely on these
paltry wages are living at near-poverty level and with high unemployment and
weak worker rights, it is difficult to demand fair compensation from
employers.

[http://www.peri.umass.edu/fileadmin/pdf/resources/Minimum_Wa...](http://www.peri.umass.edu/fileadmin/pdf/resources/Minimum_Wage_petition_website.pdf)

>In 1968, the real value of the minimum wage was $10.65, so that, in fact, an
increase today to a $10.50 federal minimum would not even bring the minimum
wage fully back to the 1968 standard. Moreover, since 1968, average U.S. labor
productivity has risen by 135 percent. Thus, if, since 1968, the U.S. minimum
wage had only just kept up with inflation and average labor productivity
growth, the minimum wage today would be $25.00.

~~~
digz
Workforce is not responsible for productivity increases... technology is.

Also, minimum wage is a terrible measure to use here. Look at median wages, or
even look at the upper end of the bottom quintile. Less than 3% of the
country's workforce earns at or below minimum wage.
[[http://www.bls.gov/cps/minwage2012.htm](http://www.bls.gov/cps/minwage2012.htm)]

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eterm
To be fair, while that budget is missing a lot of spending items it also ends
with $800 "spending money", which presumably makes up for some of it.

Assuming so many hours worked is rather sickening though.

~~~
revelation
If you take away the second job they calculated with, as obviously you should,
that 800$ actually reverse direction into negative money.

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bdfh42
In the UK, we the tax payers subsidise the McD's minimum wage so that their
employees can actually live. We pay housing cost subsidies and pay the utility
taxes and ... . madness - we subsidise their terrible wages just so we can buy
a terrible burger at a silly low price.

~~~
citricsquid
I'm not sure that we're subsidising McDonalds as much as we are supporting
people in a bad position. There will always be jobs that can't pay good wages
and it's fine that these jobs don't pay well because these are jobs that
require no skills and _should_ only be worked by people new to working who are
not dependant on their wages to live, teenagers or those in education. The
real problem is that it's becoming more and more normal for people that should
be in a career to work in a minimum wage job... forever.

My sister worked in a minimum wage job for a few years and that was fine, she
was using it to gain work experience and the money she earned was enough to
buy things she needed and to pay for her further education, now she has used
that experience (and education) to start a career and hopefully within a
couple of years she'll be well on her way to a lifetime of good earnings, all
off of the back of minimum wage. The minimum wage being higher for her would
have made no real difference, it was enough for her to justify working and to
be able to afford to invest in her future. The problem lies entirely with the
long term reliance on minimum wage, which is not a problem that McDonalds is
responsible for.

~~~
bdfh42
I have no criticism for people who take minimum wage jobs - they are stars
because they have motivation and (often) a clear view of where they are going
- so all power to your sister.

The bug bear is that a very high percentage of the people earning minimum wage
need state intervention to actually live.

If minimum wage does not pay enough to pay rent and local taxes - plus a
reasonable social security contribution (health insurance in the USA) then the
job is being subsidised by the people earning just a little more (the tax
payer?) - so this is a subsidy to the employer - often a very large one.

I resent being asked to subside jobs where employers should be required to pay
a living wage. I have no issue with the employees - only respect because they
are doing their best in a tough market place.

~~~
notahacker
What "very high" percentage? A single person working a 40 hour week for
minimum wage can afford to live without unusual subsidies, even in London,
unless you're going to abolish the NHS or introduce a poll tax. The many
_students_ working at McDonalds are certainly being heavily subsidised... and
would be even if they weren't working at McDonalds or anywhere else.

The minimum wage-earning family breadwinners whose incomes are heavily topped
up with child benefits and housing benefits might be being heavily subsidised,
but that's because their living costs far exceed those of more employable
people, not because McDonalds (or the local shop that barely scrapes a profit
most open hours) is underpaying them due to their subsidies. Cutting their
benefits gives McDonalds incentive whatsoever to raise their pay, because
there's no shortage of unemployed, unskilled people willing to cram into
shoddy shared flats and work as many hours in the week as possible.

I'm not a fan of corporate welfare like the Job Skills Agency paying a quarter
of McDonalds' annual training budget, but there's no way you can prevent the
existence of unskilled, un(der)employed people with few expenses dragging down
the earnings of unskilled employed people that can't balance their budgets
without subsidising them or auctioning off their kids.

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cianclarke
Although not doubting the author's claims, the budget itself seems a little
skewed. Who spends $90/mo on electricity? My bills come to $30/mo from Nstar -
although I don't heat or cool my apartment from this supply. Also, $100/mo for
Cable & Phone? $30/mo T-Mobile Plan + $40/mo Comcast Internet = $70/mo.
There's an extra $90/mo saving - for what it's worth.. :-(

~~~
bifrost
My power bill is around $40/month for my house, I work at home most of the
time and I live in San Francisco. Tack in about $60-70/mo in the winter when I
run the heater (gas). I am also educated enough to put on a sweater instead of
running the heater :)

That said, I think the budget is pretty skewed as well, and assumes a few
things that I propose are incorrect. For starters, having a car payment (or
really a car at all) is an incredibly bad idea. I'd also posit that living in
a non-shared situation is also un-ideal. I'd also suggest that if you're not
making enough money, you shouldn't have a cellphone nor cable TV, but I
suppose you could qualify for the infamous "Obamaphone". IMHO you could cut
$600/mo off that spend then tack on $40/mo for a bus pass, tack on $80/mo for
a reasonable healthcare bill, $30/mo for some cheap DSL or even dialup so
you're not totally off the grid. That leaves you with $450 and only working
the MCDs job.

This obviously isn't to say it'd be a marvellous life, but its not working two
jobs/etc.

I think the other disconnect is that people expect a "job" to be a "career" as
well, and IMHO thats just wrong in this situation. Someone who's working a
min-wage job is either just getting into the workforce (as a teenager or
something) or someone who can't get anything else. The someone who can't get
anything else, I don't know what to do about that, but its not the problem of
wage payers to help them out.

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yock
If ever you needed a reason to seriously evaluate what types of businesses to
support, this is it. The race to the bottom is fully supported by the average
person's spending habits.

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Glyptodon
While $20/month for health care is ludicrous, the writer's $215 claim is also
at the high end for individual coverage. Most privately carried health care
plans easily available to individuals cost between $70 and $140 dollars for
one person. The bigger issue is that copays and deductibles will quickly
escalate to the point of no being affordable should anything significant
actually go wrong - private insurance at the moment (probably until Obamacare
kicks in) is really only an effective coverage if you can afford to pay
thousands of dollars a year worst case scenario.

Anyway, the main point of the bit still stands. Just the difference between
premiums and what it would cost to actually get care was a little off.

~~~
gnoway
Is this true in all cases? I believe my folks are paying over $1k per month
for health insurance, implying more like double the writer's claim per person.

$70-$140/mo for private health insurance sounds like what you pay if you're
young and completely healthy.

~~~
kasey_junk
Young, healthy, and male. If you are a female and you want pregnancy coverage
you are going to get over that $140 very quickly.

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auctiontheory
On the plus side, all of their health needs are somehow taken care of for
$20/month. <sarcasm off>

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delinka
"There are people who comfort themselves by telling themselves that poor
people are only poor because poor people are lazy. Pretty sure someone who
works 74 hours a week isn’t lazy."

Agreed. Now, let's stop talking about _them_ for a minute and address the ones
that _are_ lazy. The ones that are only ever looking for a handout and
specifically not looking for a leg up. I know some of these people. Allow me
to paraphrase them: "Why should I do _anything_ if I'm going to get a check
from the government anyway? And why should I even _think_ about doing anything
else if all they'll do is take my guaranteed money away when I _do_ something
else?"

Now, how will we address this segment of society? Because clearly, these are
the ones in danger of becoming criminals (of which we have plenty) if they're
required to stop suckling.

Also, there are plenty in between. If the only job you're _willing_ to do is
assemble burritos for minimum wage for four hours a day, why are you entitled
to a "living wage?"

Finally, let's look at the economics. The _only_ way to not have anything
resembling a classist system is if every [productive] member of society earned
the same wage. But that's not feasible because it removes a tremendous amount
of efficiency from the market. All kinds of market indicators are gone. I
suspect (economist that I am not) it would lead to near-term economic chaos
settling into a completely non-innovative society. Why strive for anything
better when we're all "the same?"

Edit: Am I just too ranty? I don't understand the downvotes without replies.

~~~
jack-r-abbit
A little ranty. And you are kind of all over the place. Yes, there are some
people that actually are lazy and pride themselves on gaming the system and
they should be cut loose. As I read, I was actually thinking of an up vote but
then you veered off about criminals and such. I'll leave it alone then.

