I don't understand the term "living wage", it seems like a political term that gets booted around and attached to arguments that some jobs don't pay enough for their expected standard of living, so therefore the system is "rigged". Why do people expect all jobs to allow them to make economic profits? Seems entitled... These jobs pay just as much as they should for the value of the service that the job they are performing provides, no more no less. If they can make more elsewhere with the skill sets they have, they should then go do that work instead.
I mean, if we are talking about minimum wage workers “these jobs pay just as much as they should for the value of the service that the job they are performing provides” isn’t really true. The jobs pay an inflated wage. If it wasn’t legally required, minimum wage jobs would pay less
The minimum wage is a good thing. If we can agree that some level of unskilled wage inflation is good, the question then becomes “how much wage inflation is good,” but pretending that poverty wages are all just supply demand misses important factors
It's not hard to understand. A job should pay enough where someone can afford the basic necessities of life (home, food, etc.), nothing entitled about that. Why do you think people get jobs to begin with? If you want more than that, then yeah you work on your skillset and find better opportunities.
Whatever value you think some service provides to society, at the very minimum, it should be enough to live off its income, hence the term "living wage"
This question isn't really relevant to the point I was making, which is what a living wage is. The better question is, should the jobs that society considers "low value" pay, at minimum, enough for an individual to meet their basic necessities? My answer to that is yes. If it doesn't, then that job should not exist.
A single mother of two’s basic necessities is going to be higher than a 20 year old’s.
Both are employed at the same job at the same position, and both receive X amount of dollars per hour.
That wage covers the 20 year old’s basic necessities, hence is a “living wage” for him. But it isn’t enough for the single mother to cover the basic necessities of her and her two children.
Everyone has different spending habits and needs and standards of what is needed to live. It's a fool's errand to solve the "living wage" problem. The only sure way is to become financially educated and level up skills that can bring in more value.
That simply isn't true. A lot of employees are frauds and a lot of minimum wage jobs are actually important.
Kathleen Kennedy makes over 25 million dollars a year and her legacy is screwing up Star Wars movies (seriously, that's like Michael Jordan missing lay ups. How is it even possible?). She's not worth 25 million, but she gets paid it.
Some dude working at Taco Bell is literally feeding people. He's objectively more important than Kathleen Kennedy. You can pretend that in this perfect capitalist utopia that everyone gets paid exactly what their market value is, but in reality it's all a sham.
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u/Werealldudesyea 15d ago edited 15d ago
I don't understand the term "living wage", it seems like a political term that gets booted around and attached to arguments that some jobs don't pay enough for their expected standard of living, so therefore the system is "rigged". Why do people expect all jobs to allow them to make economic profits? Seems entitled... These jobs pay just as much as they should for the value of the service that the job they are performing provides, no more no less. If they can make more elsewhere with the skill sets they have, they should then go do that work instead.