332
‘A national disgrace’: 19 states to raise minimum wage but federal rate stuck at $7.25
(www.commondreams.org)
this post was submitted on 01 Jan 2026
332 points (98.8% liked)
politics
27087 readers
3157 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
There are tons of jobs that pay minimum wage where I live.
Small town grocery, for example. They know people need a job, and they don't have competition.
I live in a town of 1000 people. The town where my grocery store is has less than 4000 people. Believe me I get small towns. I live a as deep in Pennsylvania coal county as is possible. District 12 in the hunger games was LITERALLY based on where I live.
The example of the grocery store worker I gave was in my small town Weis. I was trying to recruit the kid to work at the place where I work when he told me what he made and that he was a junior in high school. HE gets paid 30% over minimum.
I think it's important to divide not just wage quality, but employment demographic. I think $10/hr is an absolutely acceptable wage for a kid in high school. That said, a shelf stocker is not the correct employment choice for a single parent. $10/hr IS a living wage for a 16 year old. I've had to make a lot of hard choices as a life long blue collar worker but I've always understood that there are SOME jobs that are not intended for "me".
I think this is where the problem starts. We talk about jobs like every position should be able so support a family. Different jobs are appropriate for different stages of life. A "living wage" means vastly different things in different places.
So it seems that the issue is that you, fundamentally, either:
A) do not believe that everybody should be compensated equal pay for equal work
Or
B) do not believe that everybody who works deserves to be able to support themselves on their income.
Furthermore, it appears to me that you are assuming a great deal about 16-year-olds. I teach high school, and most of my students are working to support their family every minute they aren't actively in school, sleeping, or ferrying themselves on public transit.
Finally, the fact that you seem to think that some jobs are simply lesser than others belies the fact that you value certain workers less. I genuinely wish that you could experience every person in one of these jobs walking out for two days, so you could witness society crumble. Do you think that the custodian should make less than the financier? Because I'll tell you which one of those jobs requires more actual labour, and, spoiler: it's not the dude throwing everyone else's wellbeing on the pyre of their own self aggrandisement.