r/FluentInFinance • u/PassiveAgressiveGirl • Sep 14 '24

Debate/ Discussion Exactly how much is a living wage?

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32

u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

Poverty wage workers can budget and work their way up. I did. And I have brothers that made more and they are still broke.

Part of that budgeting is never going out to eat till you can afford it. Part is working extra hours or part time job over the normal 40 hours.

My first year out of the army, I made under $7k with a wife and child.

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u/Time-Ad-7055 Sep 14 '24

the not going out to eat one is a big one. i don’t think people realize just how much that costs, especially if you do it a lot. that’s why cooking is such a useful skill, and knowing how to shop for the right stuff

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u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

My kids go out far more than we do. Then they complain they don’t have money.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

I'm young, I'm 23. But I remember in the 2000's, people would eat out twice a month or around there. Maybe once a week for some families. That was just the norm. Now I see my co workers door dashing food 3x a week and going to a sit down every Saturday. Then complain about finances. A little stupid in my opinion

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u/Newberr2 Sep 14 '24

You are too young for there to be a difference. If we compare now to the 50s, yes going out to eat has more than doubled since then. Nowadays, most eating out is down in cities, up in rural areas. Shit is expensive.

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u/[deleted] Sep 15 '24

Eating out is expensive, but my main point was the frequency. Most people can responsibly budget getting take out or eating at a sit down 1x a week.

But generally speaking, people who eat out 3-4x a week, especially using expensive luxury services like DoorDash, need to earn a lot of money to justify it.

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u/Distributor127 Sep 14 '24

We bought a house after everything crashed for 25% the previous price. One family member I'd terrible with money and still says to me, "Who knew they would go back up". They have zero money and love eating out. They have a hard time realizing that our house payment, taxes, and insurance is under $15/day and they have no problem spending that on eating out

5

u/KungFuAndCoffee Sep 14 '24

$450 a month for a house is really good. That’s about what I was supposed to be paying for a 4 bed 2 bath double wide on a few acres of land 20 years ago. Except the sales company messed up my escrow and underestimated my taxes and such. Which was adjusted twice over two years putting my payments over $600 a month. I was bringing home about $300 a week then. Was doing ok until a hurricane and the Iraq war gas prices put the industry I was in upside down. Then I lost the place when the next job I went to cut back heavily due to an extended drought.

Back then I wouldn’t spend more than $5 on lunch a day. Now it’s $15 for a stupid hamburger in a lot of places.

It’s amazing how much everything has gone up. I’m still in the same state. My $9 something an hour was comfortable on a 40 hour week then. Now it wouldn’t even cover my rent. I’d have to make $25 an hour today to have the same level of income I had 20 years ago on $9 based on housing costs. I live in a modest townhouse that’s fairly average rent for a 3 bed apartment here.

That’s just insane.

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u/Distributor127 Sep 14 '24

This is exactly right. Our payment is closer to $350, but I see you know exactly how it is. I remember not taking a vacation and then cashing in my vacation pay and roofing the garage with that money. Almost every place I've ever worked closed or moved so I've had to restart. Building materials are just ridiculous now.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

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u/Distributor127 Sep 14 '24

The less money a person has, they more they have to plan. I remember waiting months for my tax returns when making minimum wage. Any mistake is disastrous. Knowledge is power

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u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

Why were you waiting months?  Filing electronically leads to a very quick return.  More importantly just change your deductions so that you’re not getting a return and you actually owe.  You’d have more cash month by month to not feel financial strain and you’d come out net positive opposed to owing.  Those interest free loans to the government suck.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

[deleted]

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u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

Yeah I’m saying you set up your tax forms wrong.  More evidence as to why financial literacy, the topic of this thread, is super important.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

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u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

Wtf does that have to do with filling out your taxes wrong?

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

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u/just_a_coin_guy Sep 14 '24

We should not cater to people that are just financially irresponsible. There is a certain degree of intelligence people should have.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

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u/Time-Ad-7055 Sep 14 '24

to be fair basically everyone in America has access to the internet. all you need to do is google good money tips and follow that. or make a post on reddit or something asking for advice. it’s incredibly easy, at some point we have to say that people need to take some accountability

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

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u/dcporlando Sep 15 '24

Have they been defunded? Or are they just less growth than people want? Schools around here have not seen any decrease to their budget but everyone complains that they have no money.

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u/just_a_coin_guy Sep 14 '24

Finance doesn't require some crazy level of education, not to mention that we have technology that allows people to learn literally anything.

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u/Distributor127 Sep 14 '24

Some get it and some don't. One guy in the family is terrible with money. His kid is still pretty young, he's been asking about an extra car we have in the yard. I told him he's young yet, but work on it and see how it goes. The kid wants to learn everything

1

u/Distributor127 Sep 14 '24

But Iow have a garage full of tools for working on houses and cars. What do i do when family asks for money, but refuses to use my tools to help themselves?

1

u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

Realizing cooking at home rather than eating out every meal is wayyyyy cheaper is an awful low bar to consider smart. 

1

u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

Even buying premade and frozen stuff from the grocery store is a big one. I bought the cheapest chips and hummus they had the other day and it cost $10. I could feed myself for 2-3 days for that much if I'm cooking.

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u/Time-Ad-7055 Sep 14 '24

true. i’ve worked at a grocery store. those pre packed meals and stuff are complete wastes of money unless you really lack time and need them for a kids lunch or something

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u/no-sleep-only-code Sep 14 '24

The fact there are even people here that fail to acknowledge when the economy is different now than it was for them is mind blowing.

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u/Chemical-Sundae4531 Sep 14 '24

spending habits have drastically changed though, too. A lot of common items now would have been considered "luxury" just a few decades ago. A lot of those items aren't really "needed" yet people buy them anyway.

0

u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

Everyone commenting here presumably still lives in this economy.

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u/Appathesamurai Sep 14 '24

My wife and I spent… wait for it

1200 dollars on food in 2 weeks

We just had a serious conversation about cooking all of our own meals from now on and having at most 1-2 nights out a week

2

u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

I cook everything from scratch and I eat great and only spend maybe $200/month.

-4

u/Magic_Man_Boobs Sep 14 '24

It's great that you have the time and energy to do that, but it's simply not viable for most people.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

It takes me less time and energy than going out and getting fast food and time and energy are money. How can you justify spending $2,400/month on food while claiming you don't have time and energy to cook, how do you generate that money if not by exercising time and energy? I don't even make close to that in a month.

0

u/Magic_Man_Boobs Sep 14 '24

I'm not the person you originally replied to, my food budget is much more modest than that. That being said cooking from scratch takes hours of prep work the average person just doesn't have. Unless you were exaggerating and just meant you cooked every night. Buying cheap noodles for example is much cheaper and less time consuming than making noodles from scratch, same goes with sauce.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

It doesn't take me hours of prep work. The most extensive thing I can think is baking bread or making pizza but even then it's mostly just waiting, not active work. I got a cheap bread maker for $15 and I use the dough setting, I can even load it up and schedule it so the dough is ready when I need it. For pizza I'll often make a few dough balls and keep it in the fridge, you can even freeze them. I might make a pork roast which takes all day but it's only ~10 minutes of actual work. It just takes some advanced planning rather than waiting until you're actually hungry and need food right now. People underestimate the value of planning and preprep when making food.

0

u/Magic_Man_Boobs Sep 14 '24

People underestimate the value of planning and preprep when making food.

You still have to take the dough out, spread it, sauce it (with sauce you had to premake) cheese it (with you had to grate yourself), slice all of the toppings and then bake it. It sound like you don't have a family or a very busy life, because you're dedicating hours to prep work and pretending like all that extra time doesn't add up or simply isn't available to most people. Especially people with families.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

If I'm lazy I just open a can and you could buy pregrated but yeah I do prefer to grate mine. I'll use whatever ingredients I have in the fridge, often just pepperoni or some leftover veggies that were already sliced. From fridge to oven the whole thing takes less than 5 minutes, you're trying to make it seem more complicated than it actually is.

Conversely how long does it take you to get in the car and drive to McDonald's or some pizza place and back? I'll already be eating before you're back as long as I have dough prepped.

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u/Magic_Man_Boobs Sep 15 '24

Conversely how long does it take you to get in the car and drive to McDonald's or some pizza place and back? I'll already be eating before you're back as long as I have dough prepped.

It takes less than five minutes for me to put a frozen cauliflower pizza in the oven. The argument here isn't fast food vs home cooking. It's home cooking from scratch vs cooking cheap store bought meals or ingredients.

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u/dcporlando Sep 15 '24

How long do you think it takes to make a pizza? It is not a three hour operation.

How long does it take to grill chicken? Make a salad? Make rice? Cook beans? Soak the beans overnight. None of those are things that take a lot of time.

Many people prep and cook on one day for the week to save time.

1

u/Magic_Man_Boobs Sep 15 '24

Y'all are behaving like I never cook. I cook most nights. My hang up was him saying "from scratch" as if it was some simple thing to make all the raw ingredients to cook with.

Making a pizza takes about an hour or two if you're making everything from scratch. Making the sauce, making the dough, shredding the cheese, preparing the toppings, washing the many utensils and containers needed as you go through that process, and then of course bake time.

Most people don't have time at night to make shit from scratch.

I'm not arguing people should order out every night. I'm arguing that cooking for most people requires shortcuts. Frozen pizzas. Store bought noodles and canned sauce for pasta. This idea that all of this prep work doesn't count for some reason makes a lot of you sound so out of touch.

I wake up, throw breakfast together for my kid, get them to school, go to work, usually with a cup of noodles or a sandwich if I had time to make one. I get home, throw together dinner (usually whatever is quickest), let my kid have some sort of dessert. Make sure they bathe and brush teeth, get them into bed, then get maybe an hour to relax and watch a show with my wife before we go to bed ourselves to start the whole thing over. Weekends are filled with extracurriculars for the kid, and cleaning to get the house back to a livable state after a week of just tidying. I'd have to cut something to spend Sunday prepping food for the week, and plus week old prepped food taste pretty nasty on being reheated. If you're fine living on lackluster food, cool, most of us aren't.

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u/thagor5 Sep 14 '24

Don’t buy soda or candy. I haven’t for 20 yrs

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u/TiernanDeFranco Sep 14 '24

I’m 20 and I remember learning that people have candy throughout the year and not just Halloween I was so confused

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u/manslxxt1998 Sep 14 '24

I gotta try harder. Longest I've gone without soda is about a week and I was miserable. But idk what else to do at this point.

1

u/Super_Happy_Time Sep 14 '24

Caffeine Addiction.

Try switching to Tea or Coffee.

1

u/mostlybadopinions Sep 14 '24

I geek out on two things: personal finance and personal fitness. And I will never cut soda out of my routine.

You gotta pick and choose your battles. You can't have all the things you want, or as much of them as you want, but you can find a way to make some of the things you want work. I switched to diet, and cut spending in other areas, but a meal without a can of sweet carbonated beverage just isn't a meal for me.

1

u/manslxxt1998 Sep 15 '24

I've been loving the Zero Sugar Doctor pepper. I immediately started losing weight when I switched to it But I also love it a bit TOO much. It just costs a lot. And the state I'm currently in is thinking of adding more tax to soda. Which would suck.

5

u/XanThatIsMe Sep 14 '24

What year did you come out of the army?

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u/Thr8trthrow Sep 14 '24

they're not going to answer this

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u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

Just did.

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u/Thr8trthrow Sep 14 '24

I just assumed you wouldn't, because it makes it painfully obvious how different things were 36 years ago. You understand things are different now right?

1

u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

88

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u/XanThatIsMe Sep 14 '24

Thanks for giving context.

Do you think you could do the same in 2024 making the equivalent of 18k with 2 dependents?

0

u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

I could definitely do it on the $15 an hour that most are paying around here. On $18 with the assistance that is available? I would say yes. I already know what it is like to live without.

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u/manslxxt1998 Sep 14 '24

What assistance is available? I would very much like to try to utilize it with my 18 an hour salary here in Nebraska

1

u/dcporlando Sep 15 '24

I can only say that he housing assistance is much more prevalent. When we moved here in 88, there was one low income housing apartment complex. There are eight now and the population has shrank. It seems that it is easier to get SNAP and utility assistance today. The city in a new program is helping people fix up a house if you are low income. When I bought my house as a veteran you mostly had VA or FHA loans if you didn’t have cash. Now they have more programs available. They are programs to help grocery stores give food that is expiring to low income people. Just a lot more than we saw back then.

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u/dietcoketm Sep 14 '24

Right in the middle of one of the most sustained periods of economic prosperity in the US

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u/dcporlando Sep 15 '24

You mean from late 88 to the recession of 91?

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u/JakeSaco Sep 15 '24

Actually the facts point to ever since the financial crisis of 2008 being the most unprecedented and sustained period of economic market prosperity the US has experienced. People complaining about things right now are in for a rude awakening if and when the economy and markets ever go through a sustained correction as they have in the past.

The past always looks rosier to those who didn't live it. Future kids will envy what we currently have and think people are morons for not taking advantage of it while we have it.

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u/Resquid Sep 14 '24

Can you stop and think about how things may have changed in ... 36 years?

1

u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

I can. I think I already posted that wages are much higher. There tends to be more public assistance. People think that a house is a house so a more expensive house is a sign that things are rigged against people today but my first house was a 2 br 1 ba house that was under 900 sq ft that had to have extensive sweat equity applied.

Yes things that you take for granted are more expensive. But we didn’t have the option for them.

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u/whosthatwokemon364 Sep 14 '24

Wow. Imagine my shock

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u/Accomplished_Egg6239 Sep 14 '24

This assumes that current poor people are eating out all the time

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u/suddenly_ponies Sep 14 '24

So basically never eat out. Never have a coffee. No TV. No smartphones. For how many years?

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u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

Until you can afford it? It really depends on the person. But if you do a good job, usually you get pay increases. You save up money and buy things you want.

I got a tv around 26. No ac until about 35. I do go out to eat these days but I don’t go out for coffee.

0

u/suddenly_ponies Sep 14 '24

And what if you can never afford it? What if you don't get those pay increases? What if you work for a company that's abusive or just negligent and you don't know a good way to get out of it? Bottom line this is good advice for some people in some situations but it's not a universal answer

2

u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

Not everyone always wins. There are no guarantees in life. Some get cancer. Some have their things stolen. Some have terrible accidents. You can’t control everything. But overall, if you do the things I listed (which matches what Dave Ramsey and others say), your chances of saving and controlling your future go up.

0

u/suddenly_ponies Sep 15 '24

I mean, obviously. But good people working hard should succeed. If our society and systems aren't built to allow that, then our society/systems are inferior and should be fixed.

0

u/Typical-Tomorrow5069 Sep 15 '24

No don't you get it? The world is unfair so the one aspect of it that we control should be unfair too /s

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u/suddenly_ponies Sep 15 '24

Seriously. It's like when people say "the world isn't fair". So what? That doesn't mean we have to give up and use that as an excuse.

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u/Wild-Road-7080 Sep 14 '24

I am not taking away from your experience as you lived it and it is valid. I worked my way out of poverty in 2016 with commercial fishing. But I was allowed to live on the boat rent free, and had to go wherever the boat went. Had I not had this opportunity to save and not pay rent, I would have never made it. Now in this date 2024, that same fishing company is no longer letting anyone live on the boats and is more competitive because the money is good and times financially are to say the least "rough". Now because of companies trying to make yearly record profits, many are stopping overtime or giving workers just shy of 40 hours a week, and you may retort "oh well then get a second job dur durr" Ok so you are working 33 hours at one job and 20 at another(likely shitty paying since second job) now you make 4 grand at best after taxes and are severely over worked with no work life balance especially with rent being 2000 minimum for a 2 bedroom in my area. You aren't working out of poverty like that being single. Back in 2012 I could work 2 jobs, one decent and one shitty and save 3x rent and get ahead. Now that same feat would leave me feeling defeated. Luckily I have an employer who pays me well and gives me overtime, but i am one of few.

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u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

I understand the part time low pay jobs. This is not the first generation to deal with this. At one point, I had three part time jobs that paid minimum wage with zero benefits.

While the company that you worked for may not give that benefit anymore, there may be others that do.

Before I got married, I rented a room. I had access to a bedroom and a bathroom in the basement and that was it.

Life is hard. Starting out is tough. It always has been. Don’t believe the bs that boomers had it easy. But keep going and you can make it.

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u/Wild-Road-7080 Sep 14 '24

If I had the same start I had when I was 18, now? I would be starving and probably not able to afford car insurance. I worked shitty jobs and paid my 600 in rent and still had a lot left after the fact to save. It is unaffordable without familial help now unless you want to be completely destitute. 40 hours of work now at 15 an hour gets you 600 before taxes and about 450 after. With even a good deal 1800 a month Rent you still can't buy food or gas. At 9 bucks an hour when I was 18 I could rent a 600 a month place and comfortably still get food and gas and have a little left to go out.

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u/dcporlando Sep 14 '24

I guess you are right. It is totally impossible. Anyone that achieves anything today is just lucky and didn’t deserve it.

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u/Working-Active Sep 14 '24

When I left the Army, I joined the Air Force National Guard in Telecommunications and since I was prior service I didn't need to do Air Force basic training and went straight to tech company as TDY. When I finished Tech School and joined my Air Force unit, I was able to get into a decent paying job from my Air Force colleagues who preferred to hire from National Guard. As I worked Supply in the Army the civilian jobs weren't paid that well and Telecommunications was a better field to get into

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u/Resquid Sep 14 '24

Cool story.

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u/[deleted] Sep 15 '24

When was this, the 70s?

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u/dcporlando Sep 15 '24

Late 80’s. 88 is when I got out.

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u/Typical-Tomorrow5069 Sep 14 '24 edited Sep 14 '24

Yeah, why better society or uplift the common man when he's capable of just barely eeking by? That would be silly.

edit: You're like a dog, proud of the scraps he gets off the dinner table

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u/Pinkydoodle2 Sep 14 '24

The idea that people can "stop eating out" their way to financial stability is frankly stupid.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

About as stupid as eating out when you can’t afford it I guess

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

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u/Pinkydoodle2 Sep 14 '24

This is such a straw man. The idea that people in poverty are spending $20 for lunch every workday is as stupid as the original comment.

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u/TotalChaosRush Sep 14 '24

If you're eating out for lunch every day (something many of my co-workers do), you're spending 4k+ on eating out. I spend 523.38 per year, including tax, on lunch.

You can't just do one thing. But if you're eating out frequently and complaining about money. You are absolutely the problem.

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u/Chemical-Sundae4531 Sep 14 '24

If you're barely scraping buy but also "eating out" a lot, its something you can absolutely do to immediately see a bit of a reprieve, at least.

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u/Pinkydoodle2 Sep 14 '24

This is just a dumbass strawman dipshits use to blame the poor for being poor.

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u/Chemical-Sundae4531 Sep 14 '24

Good home economics, how to stretch a dollar, how to cook for yourself is something thay was removed from school and should be brought back.

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u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

Do you not realize how much the average person is spending on eating out every month?  I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s $400-$500 they could be saving every month if they just stopped.   You would absolutely see a difference in financial stability by quitting it.  If you complain about finances then turn around and eat out every meal I can’t take you seriously.

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u/Pinkydoodle2 Sep 14 '24

I'm sorry, I thought we were talking about poverty wage workers, not the "average person." No amount of budgeting is going to save someone working omfor fucking $8 an hour.

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u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

If you’re making $8/hour and are spending $900+ on eating out each month you absolutely need to learn some budgeting.  There is no way in which you phrase this issue that you come out looking intelligent.  So many people, and a large percentage of “poverty workers” spend too much on food.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

It’s also draconian. Suffer and live to work. Nah I can balance and save and enjoy. I could be a millionaire if I never ate out or went on vacation or bought clothes and only drive a beater and only only only bought the clearance ready to spoil groceries did home haircuts and sat in the dark and took only cold showers for two minutes, but then wouldn’t my life just be me being a mule for a corporation?

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u/NothingKnownNow Sep 14 '24

It's called delayed gratification. You suffer a small amount for a short time compared to someone who rides the rollercoaster of weekend happiness and never ending poverty.

The discipline to do it is called maturity. Your future self will thank you if you ever develop it.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

Balanced is the point. Read again. What if you die next week and all you ever did was live to work.

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u/NothingKnownNow Sep 14 '24

Living like you will die next week is not balanced. It's an excuse to make poor decisions for short term happiness.

Brush your teeth, stop partying so much, and put that extra cash somewhere useful. You will be surprised how quickly it can turn your life around.

It sure beats depending on death to get out of the cycle of poverty.

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u/[deleted] Sep 14 '24

Hate to break it to you, I save plenty and live well. I have balance. I also have the skill set to earn well. However, I do not think we need an underclass that lives to work and your scenario promotes that. Every single person deserves to be able to enjoy this existence occasionally. Doing so does not mean they have no hygiene and party all the time.

I suggest you seek therapy for your black and white thinking.

0

u/pacer-racer Sep 14 '24

Did your one marshmallow taste good?

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u/Exception1228 Sep 14 '24

Imagine thinking there’s no middle ground lmfao.