Perhaps surprisingly, not very many people earn minimum wage, and they make up a smaller share of the workforce than they used to. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, last year 1.532 million hourly workers earned the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour; nearly 1.8 million more earned less than that because they fell under one of several exemptions (tipped employees, full-time students, certain disabled workers and others), for a total of 3.3 million hourly workers at or below the federal minimum.
That group represents 4.3% of the nation’s 75.9 million hourly-paid workers and 2.6% of all wage and salary workers. In 1979, when the BLS began regularly studying minimum-wage workers, they represented 13.4% of hourly workers and 7.9% of all wage and salary workers.
And of that small percentage who make minimum wage, 64% are part time workers. And more than half are under 24 years old.
Sorry - now that you’ve shown that you’re sloppy in your assertions, nothing stands without some proof and definitions. And I don’t know how many Walmart workers are on the dole - how many and what forms of dole? And what is it supposed to demonstrate? That it’s too easy to get on the dole?
My nephew had no problem supporting his family of four on a Walmart salary. But then, he is a hard worker and didn’t remain at their starting salary very long.
Average length of time working at Walmarts 9 months. Again, living wage, ROTFLAMO. Apparently you have never owned or run a business and responsible for profit and loss and staying in business.
Maybe in your world certainly not in the US.
I wonder with all the skut work, how in the world did the average pay rise to 61K???
My nephew started at Walmarts as a shelf jockey and now is in charge of security for 4 stores. Makes 90K a year all that with 2 years of college and no degree.
Perhaps we have this in the UK. Various people including Mark Carney have often pointed to the poor productivity of the UK compared to e.g. Japan or Germany. I feel that parental awareness is the main culprit, tey don’t know what they don’t know.
People who are capable of achieving do not require a degree, only the opportunity.
Having a degree is useful in quite a few situations, before all the degree-holders start complaining…
It’s called motivation. I have several friends who have no degree yet make 6 figures providing remodeling services. They have their own businesses and are backlogged for months.
Because in our consumer based economy, this is where the jobs are…
There is a book about the old steel towns of E.PA called Homestead. Read it years ago. nonfiction obviously. One of the chapters discussed all these steel workers, you know, big strong men, responsible for handling steel, for keeping crews safe in front of blast furnaces and molten steel…having to go down to McDonalds and apply for jobs flipping burgers…really heartbreaking in so many ways.
Why am I not working at Walmart?
My family had no accumulated wealth. Dad didnt even graduate from High School before he joined the Navy. Parents were divorced. How the hell did I end up with an engineering degree and in the top few percent of income earners?