The Minimum Wage Trap

The skinny:  Our economy kind of stinks right now.  The cost of living increases faster than the minimum wage and single people with no kids, much less families, can barely afford to live working minimum wage jobs.  Being forced to work a minimum wage or other undesirable job is often the result of a system that intentionally helps the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.  And worst, many look down upon those who work minimum wage or undesirable jobs, even though they had little or no choice.

The fat:  People sometimes get trapped in minimum wage or other undesirable jobs. Usually this is no fault of their own and often there is little they can do about it. The brutal truth of the economic picture is that the cost of living keeps rising much faster than the minimum wage, and one can barely skid by in low rent neighborhoods. That’s if you’re single with no kids.  God help them if they're stuck in a high rent neighborhood.

No wonder many give up and live off of welfare.  You won't get ahead, but at least you're not slaving away to get nowhere like you would in a minimum wage job.

No wonder many turn to crime or other undesirable job for a career.  It's high risk, but at least you have a chance to get ahead.

No wonder many turn to undesirables job for a career.  It makes you an outcast, but at least you have a chance to get ahead.

I'm not condoning living off of welfare or committing crime, but a reasonable person looks at the causes and effects like one would look at the gears in a clock.  It only makes sense that, given the economic environment we provide, a large number of people would choose those paths.  It's the sensible thing, given the conditions.  So let's change the socioeconomic conditions and encourage different outcomes.

What I'm suggesting is that socioeconomic conditions often lead to a forced choice that most wouldn’t choose unless they had to.  Their lack of privilege meant they had few options but to accept bad choices, and then the privileged look down upon them for those bad choices.

I see so many moral wrongs in that paragraph above!  And if I had my way, I would correct them all...

The wealthy have a much easier time “pulling themselves up by their bootstraps,” if that's even possible, because they have the financial resources, social network, education, and cultural background and belief system to be able to.  Many underprivileged people are taught in so many subtle and not so subtle ways that they will never amount to anything.  Hear that enough times and most begin to believe it.  Or they are faced with resistance to get ahead their entire lives that privileged people don't face.  So because of the conditions they're born into, they often have little choice about the jobs they can take.

Don't believe me?  Try playing Monopoly with three friends.  Everyone starts with $1,500.  Wait, you only get $150 instead and are skipped the first two turns.  Your old buddy Donald over there gets $5,000 to start, plus Boardwalk and Park Place too.  The other two players each get the standard $1,500.  But next game they'll only get $1,200.  And the game after that they'll only get $1,000.

Seems fair, right?

That's the myth of the American Dream right now.

Don't get me wrong:  I believe in the American Dream.  It just doesn't exist, but the rich and powerful will sell you the deception so that you don't elect politicians to tax them, because, "someday I might be rich like them, too".  No.  You won't.  And even if you were, which you won't, you could afford the extra tax to help the poor have opportunities.  Because you'd be rich.  See how that works?

Yes, many who work minimum wage or undesirable jobs, and many on welfare, may have given up on the dream of more. Why? Because those who have more certainly don’t want to give up their piece of the pie.

They like to have an underclass to prop them up.  Many of the rich and powerful do not want a level playing field, folks.  (There are, actually, wealthy Americans who want to be taxed more, because they're not evil.  It's actually selfish, too.  When it becomes the best of times and the worst of times the poor each the rich.  No one wants that, especially the rich.  So a healthy middle class is a good stabilizer for all.)

It’s not inevitable for any one person to stay within their own socioeconomic class.  Anyone can cite A Hero From The Projects Who Became Rich as the shining example to slay my logic.  That, actually, proves it even more.  A few outliers demonstrates that they are the exception to the rule.  The majority of people have great difficulty escaping poverty or other under-privileged conditions.  In the meantime, the rich keep getting richer while the poor keep getting poorer.

Why, then, do we still look down upon people who struggle to get by, who work minimum wage or undesirable jobs?  This is not of their choosing!  They did not ask for this life!  How dare you look down on them!

How dare you look down upon anyone.

Instead, it would be better if society provided opportunity for all to find and unleash their potential instead of robbing it.  Everyone should have educational, training, medical, and housing assistance as needed.  Yes, the trick is to stimulate a desire to grow and be something, and not to stagnate.  That is the key.  But denying the assistance necessary because you believe any assistance must always lead to stagnation is simply not true.  What matters is what programs are offered and how.

And, to be clear, no, I am not a socialist or communist and I am not against capitalism.  It just needs reforms a major overhaul.  And I just so happen to have empathy for people who are not me or almost like me.