So Congress thinks that min. wage should stay the same. 5.15 an hour, could you start a family on that?

Question

I think we should pay Congress min. wage, build a housing project behind the white house, bus them to work everyday and see how much they raise the min. wage to then. What do you think would it work???????????

Answer 1

Whats amazing about this is that, while voting down a minimum wage increase 9 times over the last 10 years, they've voted to increase their pay 7 times. How's that for hypocracy?



I think Congress and the Senate should be paid the same way we pay them here in NH, $100 per year plus expenses.



Just another point - About half of all hourly-paid workers earning $5.15 or less were over age 25. Over 3/4 of minimum wage workers work full time. Just disputing a few "facts" others have quoted without sources.

Answer 2

Can you start a family on nothing? No.



And thats what you would condem people to do because minimum wage is directly correlated with unemployment.



Think of it this way. Lets say we would increase minimum wage to $100 per hour. What would the result be. All non essential personel would be fired. Lots of businesses would close. And those lucky enough to still have jobs would have to work a whole lot harder to make up for the fact that there are so few workers.



That happens on a small scale every time minimum wage is increased. If I have 20 workers working for minimum wage, which is increased from 5.50 to 7.50, I will fire four or five of them and divide the remaining work among the remaining workers.



On another point, why shouldn't I be allowed to work for whatever I want? Lets say I'm a high school student trying to find a job over the summer. I want to make money, but I also want experience in an office setting. I can get a minimum wage job working in the grocery store (no experience), or I can get nothing working in an office as an unpaid intern. If there were no minimum wage, I could take the internship at $3.50 per hour, make some money and get some experience. But I'm not allowed to because the government says I must work for $5.50 or nothing.



A third point is that people need to be responsible. If you can't afford to have a family, don't have kids. That isn't the government's problem.

Answer 3

No way to raise a family on $5.15 an hour, and by no means is that congress' intentions. Everyone's goal with respect to money is to always make more of it. While $5.15 is certainly enough for a 16 or 17 year old. You shouldn't make that job your career goal, and if you are, then the education system put into place by congress has seriously failed you, and you are an exception to the rule, and not the rule itself. With the proper education, skills, and experience along the way, by the time you're mature enough to raise a family, chances are you'll be making a whole lot more than $5.15 an hour. Simply raising the minimum wage in our country will not provide for a family. That's not at all what it is intended to do. Say for example we determine that in order to raise a family it will cost $50,000 (just an arbitrary number) a year. That translates into roughly $24.04 an hour. So what you're saying is raise the minimum wage to whatever it takes to support a family. Do you have any idea what doing that might do to the cost of a simple hamburger at McDonalds?

Answer 4

No matter what kind of job you have you should at least be able to afford the necessities. At $5.15 an hour you couldn't afford rent for a month so you definitely couldn't raise a family on it unless you work more than one job and even that's pushing it. And someone wrote on here that people who can only work at a place that offers minimum wage shouldn't have a family...that's real compassionate. What if they are taking care of their parents or something like that? Shouldn't they have a right to make a decent living? I think so. And Congress has absolutely no problem giving themselves raises. Do they need it? Nope so why not give something back to the people. That would be refreshing.

Answer 5

No, you couldn't. Actually, you really shouldn't be attempting to start a family on $5.15 an hour. You should at least try and graduate high school first and heck you could get a job a WalMart for more than $5.15 an hour.



Minimum wage isn't meant to live on just as Social Security wasn't. Minimum wage was meant to be for school kids and college students not something to make a career of or support a family on. Anyhow, suggesting that we should pay Congress min. wage is stupid. If you worked as hard as most of them to get where they are you would deserve to make good money too.

Answer 6

"So Congress thinks that min. wage should stay the same. 5.15 an hour, could you start a family on that?"



Only if the family also received:

1) food stamps, or other assistance for buying food

2) housing assistance

and

3) had 2 adults earning minimum wage full time, and at least one working part time on top of that. That would allow a family to survive. Prospering would not start until the minimum wage earners at least doubled their wages.

Answer 7

Minimum wage is not meant to support a family. It is a stepping stone to better wages and jobs. You get better jobs & wages if you educate your self. You get better wages and jobs if you try to excel at your minimum wage job. If you are supporting a family on minimum wages put a damn rubber on and work hard to advance. Go back to school - there are thousands of grants and gov't funding available to people who want to learn and better themselves.

Where do you stop raising the minimum wage - $8.00, $13.00, or $25.00? $13.00 to $25.00 is the wage for skilled workers. Why should an untrained, uneducated person make the same amount of money that a trained educated person makes. The trained person had to struggle and work hard to acheive his wage and now you want to give it away to someone who has no drive, desire and is producing childern without being able to support them. Sterilization would be a better option that way the person only has to support themselves and minimum wage can do that.

While we at it - why don't we just take away all the good grades that hard working studens achieve and give them to underachieving students. This way we can dummy down society and make us all dependant on socialism and liberals.

Answer 8

why not just make it mandatory that everyone gives all their money to the government, then the government redistributes that money to everone equally.



Raising the minimum wages increases inflation and has a washout effect on the lowest earners in society. Not only that small business suffer, and will eliminate one job for every five to replace each dollar increase in the minimum wage. Further, the increase in labor demands for those that keep their job must meet the shortfall of the terminated employee.



We should not raise the minimum wage. We shuld eliminate it. It is a shackle that prevents people from achieving their goal. If you want more money, then you need to improve yourself. It is not the responsibility of your employer to pay your bills and provide for your family. It is yours. If you want to make the life of your family better, get a better job or start your own business.

Answer 9

Why do people think they are entitled to a minimum wage of any amount? If you don't like the wage don't take the position. If you can't raise a family on the pay don't have a family. If you have a family than don't accept the pay. This is America you know. America does not owe you anything you owe America everything.

Answer 10

If you are making min. wage, why do you want to start a family? You need to go to school and get an education so you don't get paid minimun wage. If you are a teenager, $5.15 is enough for you. This is supposed to be a motivator to stay in school.

Answer 11

The minimum wage is a bad idea. The only ones who only earn the minimum wage are those who have no skills, or are just starting out.



The market should be allowed to set the value of labor, not the government. If someone is willing to do a job for $3.00 per hour (assuming that they are a legal worker) that is what the job is worth. If no one is willing to do the job for $15.00 per hour, the employer will have to pay more. In the DC area, gas station cashiers, and workers at fast food places are starting at over $7.00 per hour, due to market conditions.



When there is a raise in the cost of employees, the employer has to re-evaluate the value of said employees. For example, I have a business. If I hire a high school kid to sweep the floors and empty the trash, and pay him $5.25 an hour, he is actually costing me more than that. I have to pay workman’s comp, unemployment tax, and social security for him. He is actually costing me over $6.00 per hour. Lets assume that he is working 20 hours a week. My cost for him is about $120 per week.



If the minimum wage were to be raised to 6.25 per hour, my costs for this person would go up by $20 per week. I would then have to decide if he was worth the extra money. Most likely, I would end up either letting him go, because his cost exceeded his value to me, or cutting back his hours.



I pay my employees a fair wage. I hire some people with few skills and train them. If the cost of employees goes up, I cut back on the number of hires, and do not hire unskilled people.

Answer 12

Minimum wage is all a sixteen year old needs to make. No one is saying that 5.15 is a great salary with which to raise a family... but it's your choice if you decide to work for that pay.

Answer 13

Yea, congress has no problem giving themselves a raise. Where I live in Michigan they just raised the min wage to near $7/hr.

Answer 14

I agree with you. I'm just out of school, but I make $10 hr plus commision, and I barley have money after I get the bills payed. I can't imagin working for min. wage. You have to remember though. Those people are mostly Republicans, and they're for the rich.

Answer 15

The minimum wage was never meant to be there to start a family on. It's there to help people get a start and not get royally screwed. If your starting a family on min. wage, it's very tough, but that's not it's intention.

Answer 16

lol! i think thats a great idea...i dont understand how congress could think that b/c congress is heald in DC and i live in MD and every1 knows that in hte DC/MD/VA area housing prices is beyond crazy! even getting an apartment is expensive. bus fare is $1.25 and it adds up if u take the bus to and from work. food is expensive and cheap food usually leads to obesity. $5.15 per hour is a joke! it needs to be raised to at least $6.50per hour.



congress might as well raise it! its not like their income is really gonna suffer...

Answer 17

not at all. actually, weve been having debates here in charlottesville over whether the minimun wage for UVA employees should be raised to 10.00 an hour, over the existing 7.35 an hour because of the struggle to raise a family in charlottesville on 7.35 an hour.

i think its a damn good idea. i mean, prices are raising, inflation is always happening. its hard to make it on minimum wage alone, much less raise a family on that. i think it should deffinetly be raised...

Answer 18

You must live in Jersey...LOL!



I am 27 and I have a good job and I still can barely survive. I live in a one BR condo and have a new car and it is tough paying the bills. With gas prices going up, electricity going up, etc. minimum wage will only buy you a gallon of gas.....I feel for ya, I really do!



This country works for everyone else in the world and doesn't help its own people. SAD! REALLY SAD!

Answer 19

Minimum wage jobs are not jobs that you should be raising a family on. They are jobs that students should be covering. The answer is get a job that pays more. There are plenty of them out there.

Answer 20

I make $13.00 an hour and cant even keep up with the rent or bills, i feel so sorry for the people would have to work for 5.15 an hr, I wouldn't know what to do...

Answer 21

Yes, that is excellent idea. I mean these people represent the people so if they lived off of 5.15/hr. Why do they need a salary anyway, They get everything free. Rides, Homes, education for their children Free. Good idea

Answer 22

why would anyone want to start a family on $5.15 an hour wages?

Answer 23

With much less people working, it variety of feels like there could be much less "stuff" being made. If 6 million vehicles are being made each and each year and seven million people choose vehicles, then it truly is not significant WHAT the minimum salary is, there is going to be a million people who basically isn't waiting to arise with the money for a vehicle, with the aid of fact the value will upward thrust till it meets call for. in case you in user-friendly terms say "nicely, this is inflation and we can basically boost the minimum salary extra to compensate", then you truly are not awareness what i'm asserting.

Answer 24

It really needs to go up. I say minimum wage should be like 8 dollars.

Answer 25

I have a solution to the minimum wage problem: work harder. If all you can get is a minimum wage job, then you should be making babies.

Answer 26

Your plan to "help" congress understand is right on. The wages and benifits that are enacted by laws they create, should be impacted by there personal lifestyles first!!!! And if they like it, well then it will be good enough for us...

Answer 27

You shouldn't be starting a family if all your qualified to do is work for minimum wage!

Answer 28

Love your idea was going to suggest a similar answer myself. You can't, in todays' world raise a cat on that salary. Unions used to take care of problems like this but the rich owners managed to get rid of most of them. And of course there own corruption. The problem is that they have outsourced so many of our jobs that for fear of losing them all people are afraid to protest stupidity like this.

Answer 29

All through my long lifetime, every time they raise it then everything else goes up in price. Everything!! So you never feel the wage increase at all.

Answer 30

something around 8.50 is the minimum wage i think, that will allow ONE person to live off of with an extremely low cost housing solution, bills, etc.

Answer 31

Minimum wage jobs should be for entry level workers...first jobs...or thouse that just won't cut it.

Minimum wage earners should not have children.

Do better for yourself!

A minimum wage earner should hate his/her job and do everything he/she can to improve themselves and move up.

Answer 32

Of course you could start a family on that. Sex is free. You couldn't actually support a family on that, but starting on is all too easy.

Answer 33

politicians routinely vote themsleves raises and COLA increases, it's sad they won't even help the little people that put them there, i hate politicians...i may never vote again...i don't have much faith in the process anymore....too many scandals with those a**holes.....

Answer 34

NICE!!!!! That's the absolute BEST idea I have heard yet! If you need volunteers, I'm down 4 whateva!!!!!!! Lets go! Road trip!

Answer 35

they seem to vote themselves a raise all the time

Answer 36

I wouldnt be able to afford gas on that.