This part gripes me when they travel to “less fortunate” or “poor” countries where eating out is $0.50-2.00 but the same or similar thing is $30-500 in the US, however: people earn different levels of income. Like in that “third world” country, people may only live with $10 a day while Americans live with either $7.25 / $15 per hour in minimum wage, so it’s not comparable as to why the prices are seen as “cheap” by Americans.
Now, put it this way: if an average joe were to earn the FEDERAL mandated minimum wage of $7.25, is buying a whole weeks worth of groceries affordable with that alone (excluding rent, utilities, insurance, etc)? Do you consider a $200 semi-fancy dinner at a restaurant (not over the top luxurious, but formal & fine dining) with family or friends “cheap” in the US whilst earning $15 (or even $30) per hour in minimum wage?
Nobody making $8 an hour is spending $200 on something so transient as a meal without some serious consideration. That’s 24 hours of labor (spread over at least 2 days) for something that may last for 2 hours and will sustain you for 8-12 hours.
MIT made a living wage calculator that shows that federal minimum wage is basically not sustainable anywhere.
https://livingwage.mit.edu/
MIT living wage calculator is not really accurate. It says you need 70K to support yourself in my city… that’s not really true. There are also way more factors involved and people’s perceptions of what a ‘living wage’ are wildly skewed. I make about 150K and many folks think I am living in poverty in my city.
Some of these ‘costs’ are wildly over and wildly under, and very hard to generalize because people have such wildly different living standards/expectations. Someone who is 20yo is going to have way lower costs than someone who is 50yo.
My brother, a living wage includes “Adequate income for food shelter and recreation”
yes, as imagined by some MIT people, who are overwhelmingly wealthy/upper middle class types. it’s a theoretical measure, not one reflective of people’s real lives. This is your typical ‘academic researcher totally out of touch with how real people live their lives’ stuff.
70K for 22 year old is a boatload of money, it’s not ‘adequate’ for someone who is 65 and has to live in an assisted facility, it wouldn’t cover the basic costs, they’d need closer to 100K+