Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

[shelbylovesmelby]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

That's not exactly true. Some companies give only a few cents raise once a year. So if you are really-really good employee, you will get maybe 30c raise, and if you are average employee, you will get 20c raise. so, sometimes people don't want to work extra hard for nothing.

Thank you for pointing that out!!!! As my dh for his annual review recieved a handshake, nice job, better luck next year because he's topped out @ his position. But how can one be topped out when the cost of living hasn't topped out???? He signs up to work o/t & he's usually the last one to be called in because he's topped out & they'd rather pay the newbie making $7/hr the o/t or farm the work out than pay my dh o/t.

Now if I go back to work full time & put two kids in day care & start in the minimum wage bracket again I'd be in the hole & miss alot of the joys & firsts of their childhood all so I could pay DAY CARE!

So if we have to have less than what we had before we had a house & kids so be it! I can't get back this time with my kids over $5.15 an hr! (though I plan on working part time when we are done having a family & everyone is in school!)

[cicy33]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I live in southern Illinois and our min wage is 6.50. Waitresses make 3.90 per hour. So we are better off than some. Unfortunately most jobs here pay either the min or about 7. also unfortunately the rent is out of sight here. amazing for such a small area. I called about a house for a friend the other day. a 3 bedroom, 1 bath, with a carport is 650 a month!!!! Who can afford that?? and the house was not that nice. As a matter of fact it is a little trashy looking from the outside. I am far more fortunate than most people but I did my years on public aid and working for min wage and worked my way up. It is hard but it is also possible. Which brings me to my next vent! I was working for a company that paid me 425 a week salary, so my holidays were paid, they let me take a week paid vacation each year, I had full paid benefits, plus a simple ira program. The bad part?? They went out of business and I lost my job. I am trying to find another one that is comparable but it is really hard. So I may have to "settle" for a lower paid job. No job is safe these days. Another company in our area that employs roughly 1000 people is closing at xmas. Nice, huh.

[Ima saver]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

Our rent around here starts at about $900 a month unless you want a dumpy old trailer. I don't know how people do it!

[shelbylovesmelby]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

Here the min wage is $5.15! Rent around here in a suburban neighborhood for a house is $1200+ /mo without heat! <--- you may as well buy for that amt of rent KWIM?
For a good apartment in the burbs it's atleast $725 for a 2 bed 1.5 bath w/ heat! So unless you have alot of room mates or bought your home cheap (like we did) you're sol til Ed McMahon knocks on your door or you win the lottery.
But there's always the alternative & live in the "hood" of milwaukee & pay a few hundred $ to rent a roach motel as my sil spent more nights than she's told us in a closet because of gunshots going off! NO thanks!

Also don't forget the interest rates going up as well as the cost of homes have been skyrocketing. As our home has gained 20,000 every year we've owned it!!! So if we were to buy it today we couldn't afford it!!! w/ a gain of $60,000 in 3 yrs! So much for having a "starter" house, but a house is still a house just the same.

[lrjohnson]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

If an individual has the PERSONAL drive and ambition to change their situation...THEY CAN. It may mean sacrifice, it may mean extremly hard work, but they can do it.

Now that said....most will not make the choice to do that. Most can not grasp that they can do that. Many are not willing to do that. That does not make them lesser people, it's just how it is.

I would like to see an America in which a child can be ordinary, not extraordinary, and have a good life. With what some kids are born into (neighborhoods, parents, families, school systems) it would be asking them to be extraordinary to make a different life.

[DivaJen]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I Completely Agree With Goodbuygirl. I Used To Feel So Pressed For Money When I Was A Student.

Way off topic, but why do a few posters here capitalize every word now and then? It's hard to read...

[neatdesign]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

That's not exactly true. Some companies give only a few cents raise once a year. So if you are really-really good employee, you will get maybe 30c raise, and if you are average employee, you will get 20c raise. so, sometimes people don't want to work extra hard for nothing.

I agree. In 2001, I took a job as a designer in a frame shop for $6.25/hour. I wasn't too bothered by the low pay at first because I figured I'd be able to work up the ladder and earn something more decent. After six months I asked for a performance review and only got a measly 25¢ raise. This is despite the fact that my review was very positive AND I have an associates degree in graphic design in addition to a bachelor's degree.

When my first year anniversary came up they passed me over for a raise completely, saying it was because I had "already gotten a raise" that year. I quit and went to Capital One where I earned double what I made at the frame shop. Ironically, when I got burnt out from that job I ended up BACK in the frame shop, this time making $7.25/hour but now I have the experience to know that I won't be moving up there at all. I'm waiting to hear back from a potential employer any day now...

~ Jenney

[neatdesign]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I saw a preview for a new Will Smith movie called "Pursuit of Happyness" (don't ask me why they chose to misspell happiness).

It was misspelled intentionally by the book's author.

~ Jenney

[PrincessPerky]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

You know before we look at how 'terrible' ordinary kids have it, we might want to look at how ordinary kids in say africa have it..we get runnig water, for even the poorest, and it is drinkable, might not be to my preferenc (brita filter fan here) but it is drinkable, and not the same puddle I wash dishes in.

Yeah, I would hate to be any poorer than I am, and I would not want to give up any of my luxuries (hot shower!) but I am also not going to be discounting them as 'rights'

[cicy33]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

my sister actually spent two years in africa through her church and taught school there. She said is pretty bad but also different than here. there is no comparison. There is no walmart, you shop at open air markets. They had a house with a pool and a maid cuz if americans come there and don't hire someone to help take care of stuff they are treated very badly. they assume that americans can afford that and should! She said it was really weird to have a maid. She has never had one in her life and didn't get one when she came home. A house with a pool is considered fairly common there but she didn't specify what type of pool. I agree that kids in other countries have it worse but you know, this is America and this is where I choose to live so I feel a greater loyalty to the kids here vs there. I do not think that a single child should have to go hungry. Adults can take care of themselves, kids can't.

[rob62521]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I agree that someone has to want to improve themselves. However, if the jobs aren't out there, like Ima says, many can't improve themselves.

[Gruntina]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

It depends on what area you live in that minimum wage jobs can be very competive.

I really didn't notice this until I visit my family back home in Montana for a visit. The Fast food restaurants, waitresses and so on had much older employees than compared in Cali. After thinking about it, Montana does not offer a lot of high income jobs, just mainly Medical fields. There are no theme parks, no professional sports; high end technical companies jobs of some sort available there.

Unfortunately California making it hard for Montana. People out here buy and build expensive homes there but Montana people can not afford it. Some even moved out of their homes because more expensive houses are being built nearby thus increasing property taxes which brings it up incredibly high.

The only frustrating thing for to see is a lot of homes around the lakes are not from Montana people. Many owners of their home only go there between 2 to 4 weeks to enjoy Christmas in the snow and a summer vacation.

But I do see another trend... the rich are building too many new properties there and there is very few to be able to afford them so they are stuck with it.

[lrjohnson]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

Way off topic, but why do a few posters here capitalize every word now and then? It's hard to read...

Diva: I'm guessing here, so grain of salt and all that. I suspect they are typing a response in a word processing program in All Caps, they the use the "Change Case" feature, and instead of saying sentence case they are choosing title case. It may be a wrong guess, but it stopped me from pondering too much more.

[abowers]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

also unfortunately the rent is out of sight here. amazing for such a small area. I called about a house for a friend the other day. a 3 bedroom, 1 bath, with a carport is 650 a month!!!! Who can afford that?? and the house was not that nice. As a matter of fact it is a little trashy looking from the outside.

This is actually funny to me, because I just moved out of an apartment where I was paying $829/month for a 1 BR, 1 BA apartment, gas and water included.

This is a "deal" for the area too, because it's "university subsidized housing."
Luckily my boyfriend and I are splitting the rent, but I was taking home $1200/month as a preschool teacher. I'm making $2 less per hour now as a grad assistant.

We just moved to an older (also "university subsidized") grad student apartment, 2 BR 1 BA for $760/month, nothing included (cable, gas, electric, water, etc).

[boefixepa]

Re: Oprah - Living on Minimum Wage

I'm odd, I've accepted it. Everyone that really know me agree with me, or has had a hand in convincing me.

I take acception to the 'idea' that people can not change their lives.

For example,

Ima, you keep saying how hard it was for you and how you had to work years as a waitress earning near nothing....but Ima....you did it! Look at where you are now. Changes like these are not instant. They are summation of years of choices and lifestyles. It was not easy right? But show me one life that is? The person living it would agrue with you!

You have to constantly fight the uphill battle. It may take years, decades, or a life time, but to say it can't be done...well that's your choice and you have to live with the consequences.

Someone said that wouldn't it be nice if an ordinary person could live comfortably.....

Now that's difficult and unsettleing for me....it rubs to close to the feeling of something I've come to call 'settleing for mediocracy'

If people aren't willing to work and strive to do their best, then it's a pipe dream for them to expect the best out of life. You get what you put in. Each life is also individual, each is happy and satisfied at a different level.

Sorry in advance that I don't have the title and author, but this poem sums it up well for me. I think often about it and it rings true from my life perspective.

The tree that never had to fight
For sun and sky and air and light,
But stood out in the open plain
And always got its share of rain,
Never became a forest king
But lived and died a scrubby thing.

The man who never had to toil
To gain and farm his patch of soil,
Who never had to win his share
Of sun and sky and light and air,
Never became a manly man
But lived and died as he began.

Good timber does not grow with ease,
The stronger wind, the stronger trees,
The further sky, the greater length,
The more the storm, the more the strength.
By sun and cold, by rain and snow,
In trees and men good timbers grow.

Where thickest lies the forest growth
We find the patriarchs of both.
And they hold counsel with the stars
Whose broken branches show the scars
Of many winds and much of strife.
This is the common law of life.

To quote a cheesy movie with a great morle

A man can change his stars