I’m a millennial. In my 40’s. My first job was working at a video rental store that no longer exists. When I was working there, they raised the minimum wage to 7.25 an hour. And in my entire adult working life since, that rate has not increased, now going on 20 years.
The fact that over 30% of the states in this country STILL only pay that same minimum wage is abhorrent. No one in those states has made a dime in 20 years, they have only had their purchasing power decrease as inflation outpaced their pay.
An entire generation of Americans worked the best 20 years of their entire adult lives just to lose money from doing it if it happened in those states.
100% agree with you. I’m 45. while I worked my way through college, I made something like 14K a year, which was enough to cover a room rental, and food. When I started graduate school 4 years later, I managed 26K. I finished my PhD in 2008 and graduated into recession where the federal minimum for postdoctoral fellows was around 35K. NIH funded positions and labs had to pay the minimum, and generally didn’t pay more than that. (When I computed the hours I was working vs my fixed salary, I was making $10 an hour, It’s what pushed me to leave my field of study.) Now I make $52K. My income has doubled in the past 20 years, but costs for housing, food, and healthcare have far outpaced the wage increases I’ve seen. I’m no better off today than when I was a graduate student.
I’m a millennial. In my 40’s. My first job was working at a video rental store that no longer exists. When I was working there, they raised the minimum wage to 7.25 an hour. And in my entire adult working life since, that rate has not increased, now going on 20 years.
The fact that over 30% of the states in this country STILL only pay that same minimum wage is abhorrent. No one in those states has made a dime in 20 years, they have only had their purchasing power decrease as inflation outpaced their pay.
An entire generation of Americans worked the best 20 years of their entire adult lives just to lose money from doing it if it happened in those states.
100% agree with you. I’m 45. while I worked my way through college, I made something like 14K a year, which was enough to cover a room rental, and food. When I started graduate school 4 years later, I managed 26K. I finished my PhD in 2008 and graduated into recession where the federal minimum for postdoctoral fellows was around 35K. NIH funded positions and labs had to pay the minimum, and generally didn’t pay more than that. (When I computed the hours I was working vs my fixed salary, I was making $10 an hour, It’s what pushed me to leave my field of study.) Now I make $52K. My income has doubled in the past 20 years, but costs for housing, food, and healthcare have far outpaced the wage increases I’ve seen. I’m no better off today than when I was a graduate student.