Food for thought :eyebrow:

First, hi to everyone, My internet free lifestyle has been somewhat successful, but lately I've been needing to use it for job seeking. (Another thread for another time.)

Maybe this belongs in politics, it seems like a political issue, if Bernie Sanders is anyone to go by.

Doing some numbers crunching: figuring my monthly nut and trying to find how much I need to earn to make things work. I've already cut everything to the bone, e.g. My only expenses are mortgage (ins and tax escrowed) electricity, trash, water, oil heat, propane cooking, car ins, gasoline, food, health ins. No entertainment, meals out, internet, cable, new clothes, vacation, savings or RMR (repair, maintenance, reserve).

Being that I am at, or somewhat below, Federal Poverty Level (FPL=$20,090./yr) I am eligible for and avail myself of these federal programs:

Food stamps
HEAP (heating and energy assistance)
Medicaid

Wanting to get off the federal tit and raise my standard of living, I decided to calculate how much I'd need to earn to actually meet this standard of living and then to go above it.

My food stamp benefit is roughly $500 a month or $6,000/yr.

My HEAP benefit is about $1500 for the heating season, so $1500/yr.

Medicaid, in case you aren't aware is by far the best health insurance available today. $0-$5 copay for office visits, therapy, and other treatments, $0 copay for surgery, lab tests, MRI, X-ray, or hospital visits, $0, $1, $3 copay for prescription drugs. Vision and dental also covered, although you can only get the cheapest frames and lenses, no upgrading, but still, $0.

If you see a therapist regularly, or have a chronic medical condition requiring ongoing treatment, or frequent tests, or require an expensive medication regimen, all that can get expensive. $0 on Medicaid.

The closest plan to medicaid would be a Platinum plan and even then, you'd have copays and about $1500 out of pocket before your plan kicked in. Yearly cost of a Platinum plan in my state would run about $700/mo. or $8400/yr plus the $1500 out of pocket = $8900/yr

Adding all that up comes to $16,400 in legal benefits for a person with two kids who is earning at or less than 130% of the poverty level. (As your income goes higher, your benefits diminish slightly. My figures are based on my benefits at my income, such as it is.)

So I would need to make $36,490 a year to achieve a comparable standard of living, and that does not even include putting aside money for savings, buying a car or a house, or going shopping for clothes.

Federal minimum wage is now $7.25/hr or $15,080/yr. Where I live, minimum wage is $8/hr or $16640/yr. In either case, below FPL. Employers are letting the government (i.e. taxpayers) make up for the inadequate wages but for any small business they aren't in a position to do better. Big corporations are benefiting greatly from the federal aid programs and from the reluctance of people who are eligible for the programs to use them out of pride or fear of stigma, or maybe not even realizing that they are poor.

The upshot of all this is the disheartening realization that unless I can earn about $40,000 $45,000 a year, I'm better off in a minimum wage job. And even at 40-45k, it isn't very much money at all considering the cost of living, $67,246 for one adult with two kids, in my area. (According to the Living wage calculator: http://livingwage.mit.edu/ )

I wonder what the current income distribution looks like these days now that the middle class is finally gone.

Here's a chart from 2013, Pretty much a plateau there. For comparison, if $1000 was an inch, the 50th% would be about 6'-8" tall, the 1% would be 656' tall. The figures for 2015 are wider still.

Slacker!

Seriously though, you are brave to put your personal situation out there so clearly. We talk about this stuff in general terms but actual personal factual stories are much more compelling.

Health care is the killer expense. It's ridiculous.

I understand that we are supposed to be worried about the terrorists now, but this economic situation is far more real and personal.

My only expenses are mortgage (ins and tax escrowed)

When my particular shit hit my particular fan, I wound up not paying a lot of this and... it wound up... fine. The back insurance and taxes were even just... somehow dealt with. It remains frightening, like it should have not been so easy and there will be hell to pay, perhaps when I die.

But I may or may not have been the recipient of a lot of hidden assistance, in the form of the lesser-known Federal "Hey Banks that Fucked Everything Up, Please Solve It Without Too Much Mess" program.

I was previously a benefactor of the bank's wildly successful, "Give Shitty Mortgages To Idiots Getting Divorced So We Can Game the Market To Its Breaking Point" program.

If you are not intending to leave your house and move to a shithole, your mileage may vary wildly. Also I found out that Pennsylvania requires banks to pay all sorts of wild legal dues before actually foreclosing, so if you are not living in PA, the rules may encourage them to terminate you without prejudice.

Undertoad;948759 wrote:

When my particular shit hit my particular fan, I wound up not paying a lot of this and... it wound up... fine. The back insurance and taxes were even just... somehow dealt with. It remains frightening, like it should have not been so easy and there will be hell to pay, perhaps when I die.

But I may or may not have been the recipient of a lot of hidden assistance, in the form of the lesser-known Federal "Hey Banks that Fucked Everything Up, Please Solve It Without Too Much Mess" program.

I was previously a benefactor of the bank's wildly successful, "Give Shitty Mortgages To Idiots Getting Divorced So We Can Game the Market To Its Breaking Point" program.

If you are not intending to leave your house and move to a shithole, your mileage may vary wildly. Also I found out that Pennsylvania requires banks to pay all sorts of wild legal dues before actually foreclosing, so if you are not living in PA, the rules may encourage them to terminate you without prejudice.

Similar boat here. It seems like foreclosure might take the banks a lot longer than a year, but it is hard to say whether they start the clock with the proceedings or back date it from the first missed payment.

In any case, I'd like to stay, but if I have to leave I'm ok with liquidating everything I own and starting over from scratch. To that end, next week a buddy of mine is coming over and helping me get set up for an enormous indoor tag sale while tons of high ticket specialty shit is going up on ebay/craigslist.

I've read some banks have taken up to 6 years to evict, figuring the market to sell it is bad, and it's safer to have somebody living there so it doesn't get stripped and trashed.

Well, don't hold the place in any sort of emotional "this is where I/we need to live" spot in your brain. If you can get out, and live somewhere else cheaper, do it...

glatt;948757 wrote:

Slacker!

Seriously though, you are brave to put your personal situation out there so clearly. We talk about this stuff in general terms but actual personal factual stories are much more compelling.

Health care is the killer expense. It's ridiculous.

I understand that we are supposed to be worried about the terrorists now, but this economic situation is far more real and personal.

Terrorism, gay marriage, abortion, while all important, they are convenient red herrings. Recycling? Bullshit. It's a way to keep you busy with make work. Working 40 hours a week

http://www.mybudget360.com/how-much-do-americans-earn-what-is-the-average-us-income/ wrote:

The median wage in the US per person is $26,695. This tells us a lot since the median household income is at $50,500. Since the Census data looks at households, this data hones in on individual wage earners. 66 percent of Americans earn less than $41,212.

Do you have enough energy left over to write your congressman (as if that would do any good) or try in any way to make a change in the status quo? Of course not and I don't blame you. a) it's pointless. The game is rigged. b) you are too busy trying to survive.

There is a series by the BBC I think, called "The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear" well worth a watch when you are done sorting the recycling and helping the fundraiser for your school so they can buy books or lab equipment or something. Or read the synopsis on wikipedia.

The upshot of all this is the disheartening realization that unless I can earn about $40,000 $45,000 a year, I'm better off in a minimum wage job.

Those are hard to find, would you settle for something that pays more? Now that the labor market has returned around here, see the dregs, Philadelphia Craigslist for General Labor. The lowest I could find there is $8.50 for "standing around helping" type work. $10 for part time factory work. If you can pass a drug test, and have a minimum skill such as driving, the low wage is around $13. Your market may vary wildly.

Word on the street is common laborers, hauling 2x4s and shit, get $100 cash per day. that's also what pawn shops pay

you can collect gummint bennies and still do a cash job. not that i did but the rules of the game are different down in the dregs

$13 is only $27,000.
There is plenty of jobs paying big bucks in North Dakota, but your need to take your own living accommodations suitable for a ND winter or all the money goes back into rent. The job market is scattered and variable, and usually volatile because steady factory jobs have fled.

Yeah, it's seven shades of fucked up in this country.

Thanks for keeping it real footie.

I had hoped we'd learned from terror 1.0 not to fall for lying politicians but they seem to know which buttons to push to get the media in pee your pants scared mode.

footfootfoot;948751 wrote:

...Employers are letting the government (i.e. taxpayers) make up for the inadequate wages but for any small business they aren't in a position to do better....

Just curious as to why you think this. Is there evidence?

Forbes...

Walmart’s low-wage workers cost U.S. taxpayers an estimated $6.2 billion in public assistance including food stamps, Medicaid and subsidized housing, according to a report published to coincide with Tax Day, April 15.

Americans for Tax Fairness, a coalition of 400 national and state-level progressive groups, made this estimate using data from a 2013 study by Democratic Staff of the U.S. Committee on Education and the Workforce.

“The study estimated the cost to Wisconsin’s taxpayers of Walmart’s low wages and benefits, which often force workers to rely on various public assistance programs,” reads the report, available in full here.

“It found that a single Walmart Supercenter cost taxpayers between $904,542 and $1.75 million per year, or between $3,015 and $5,815 on average for each of 300 workers.”

Americans for Tax Fairness then took the mid-point of that range ($4,415) and multiplied it by Walmart’s approximately 1.4 million workers to come up with an estimate of the overall taxpayers’ bill for the Bentonville, Ark.-based big box giant’s staffers.

Here's a state by state breakdown.pdf
That's just walmart, the little guy use that model too.

SPOILER ALERT

Footer you were not supposed to give away the fact that, in the US, if you are poor and do not have insurance, and show up at a hospital, you are treated and given a $8,900 plan.

And here we were all amazed that in Finland they were thinking of just giving you $10,000. Ugh, Socialism! You ONLY get $10,000. In the US, you get $16,400. America, fuck yeah!
U-S-A! U-S-A!

Spexxvet;948853 wrote:

Just curious as to why you think this. Is there evidence?

For now, I'll just base this on my personal experience as a small business owner and an employee at various small businesses over the years.

an example might be your business; are you able to pay your receptionist $45,000 a year?

A CEO making 500 times the average salary of his workers, not the lowest paid worker, is probably in a position to take less money for himself, let's say 10 times the average, and use the remaining 490x to either increase all his employee's wages or perhaps to create more jobs. I'm not advocating wealth distribution, but suggesting that raising the quality of life of the group would actually raise the QOL of the CEO rather than diminish it.

(see long spoon parable)

In some ways the greed is a higher stakes version of the crab in a bucket phenomenon.

My point is that unless employers pay a living wage to employees, the government has to take up the slack and small business owners are usually not making the kind of money where they can pay employees 45-65k a year. Most of the small business owners I know in this area are not making that much.

I also think it would be possible to pay workers a living wage in this country if we didn't send all our jobs overseas. My position is, if your workforce is not based in the USA, and your corporate offices are not in the USA, then yours is not an American company and therefore not entitled to any type of government subsidy, tax relief, or any other type of benefit and you are subject to import tariffs and so on.

footfootfoot wrote:

(see long spoon parable)

In some ways the greed is a higher stakes version of the crab in a bucket phenomenon.

I did not know either of these metaphors. I like them both.

footfootfoot;948882 wrote:

A CEO making 500 times the average salary of his workers, not the lowest paid worker, is probably in a position to take less money for himself, let's say 10 times the average, and use the remaining 490x to either increase all his employee's wages or perhaps to create more jobs.

This idea survives because it's appealing, but when you look at it:

McDonald's payroll is $4800000000 and the CEO is paid $7300000 (over 600% of average worker salary) So he could only increase McD payroll to $4807300000 by forgoing his own compensation.

If the CEO of McDonalds did his job entirely pro-bono and personally wrote a check to every McDonald's employee at the end of the year, dividing his expected salary evenly to each and every one of them, that check would be for five dollars.

However. If that CEO did an outstanding job? Raises for everybody, a hundred thousand new jobs a year. If that CEO did a shitty job? Cuts, losses, pain.

So. Can another $million get the board somebody who understands the industry, finance, marketing, accounting, who can anticipate major trends, make the best decisions? Absolutely worth it, if your goal was more money and better jobs for all. You would make that tradeoff and spend that money every single time if you were deciding how management compensation should operate.

If the previous CEO wasn't cutting it, not doing the job he was paid for, which I assume is why they got the current CEO, he was being overpaid.
Why should the current CEO get more money than the last guy was getting to do what they expected the last guy to do?

Oh wait, lemme guess. Because the circle jerk culture of the 1% club says major CEOs should get a shit ton of money more than they're worth to keep up the justification for the rest of the club to get a shit ton of money. And who hires the CEOs and sets their pay grade? The board of directors which make up another chapter of the 1% family, the fuck-the-working-man club.

But nobody makes that decision expecting to lose money on it. So the reason it's a marketplace of douchebaggery, where in order to be considered you must have out-douchebagged all the other douchebags in the room, is because that's a very safe approach when everybody's money is on the line. Nevertheless, it's not their douchebag salaries that are the ruin of us all, that's my point.

(But rather than edit to add)

It's not their salaries, that's not the problem, it's their tenacious need to play everything mightily safe while the world needs change. It's their douchebaggery itself. Every place I've ever worked, company politics is the ruin of productivity. When someone cuts through that, something better becomes more important in the company culture, and it can wind up improving the world.

If you can find people who can do that, the true leaders - visionaries, motivators - they should be paid 100 times what these douchebag CEOs are paid, and it would be a bargain. I doubt there's one of em amongst the douchebags. Gates, Jobs, Larry and Sergey, they had to invent something to get into the club.

Godamnit, I went to piss and my whole post is gone. :eyebrow:
Anyway, we used to have CEOs that did a good job for a much smaller piece of the pie, and still had big houses, fancy country clubs, hot mistresses, and limos. Even the ruthless nasty robber barons cared about the country.
Now they care about the money, and the irony is they don't need it, it won't change their standard of living, it's just a way to keep score. Think of a cribbage board made of peasants and swords.

xoxoxoBruce;948866 wrote:

Forbes...

Here's a state by state breakdown.pdf
That's just walmart, the little guy use that model too.

I call Bullshit - thats just an opinion piece ...
"Americans for Tax Fairness, a coalition of 400 national and state-level progressive groups, made this estimate using data from a 2013 study by Democratic Staff of the U.S. Committee on Education and the Workforce."

Undertoad;948926 wrote:

This idea survives because it's appealing, but when you look at it:

McDonald's payroll is $4800000000 and the CEO is paid $7300000 (over 600% of average worker salary) So he could only increase McD payroll to $4807300000 by forgoing his own compensation.

Small math problem to call to your attention:

600% is six times the avg. salary. The report shows the CEO is making six hundred times the average salary. I don't know the # of McD's employees, but remember the stores are franchises and I don;t know if there is a distinction between franchise employees and McD's corp employees. Judging by the 11k figure, I'd say it's the former.

Still, as you point out that would only mean 600 more minimum wage jobs, but I suspect the effect of a small cadre of people holding 90% of the marbles makes for a shitty game of marbles. The effect of diminishing the wage gap would have a more profound effect on society as a whole than can be reckoned by looking at a single metric.

classicman;948998 wrote:

I call Bullshit - thats just an opinion piece ...
"Americans for Tax Fairness, a coalition of 400 national and state-level progressive groups, made this estimate using data from a 2013 study by Democratic Staff of the U.S. Committee on Education and the Workforce."

It is very hard to nail down exact figures on any of this. It seems to me that this isn't accidental. Despite what Tony is saying about douchebaggery, I don't see why there is a connection between someone's being "a visionary" and commanding a huge salary. I think Sanders is somewhat of a visionary and he isn't insisting on making a ton of coin. Wealth and usefulness to society are not correlated. If it were plumbers and trash collectors would live in mansions. The real function of Huge corporations isn't about being a visionary beyond coming up with visions to kep the company and its shareholders obscenely rich. A pretty narrow vision. Not only can't they see the forest, they can't see the trees for the leaves.

I hear plumbers are on the way up.

These days everybody wants to go to college. Good plumbers need to do a little math, but if you can do a little math these days, you get a medium SAT and President Sanders sends you to college. And why not, I mean after that you get a nice cushy office job, in an air-conditioned office, instead of going through crawlspaces figuring out someone else's screwed-up installation.

I admit I don't know, but some people say the average age of skilled tradespeople is increasing and some people figure we are in for a shortage on the order of 3 million of 'em.

The value of the job is no longer communicated through society's respect; therefore, it will now be communicated through hourly rates. Wealth and usefulness to society are not correlated... right up to the moment you need your shit to go down the drain. At that point, someone's gonna have to get paid.

And so, the marketplace of humanity: it's a terrible, cruel system, but nobody has figured out a better way.

classicman;948998 wrote:

I call Bullshit - thats just an opinion piece ...
"Americans for Tax Fairness, a coalition of 400 national and state-level progressive groups, made this estimate using data from a 2013 study by Democratic Staff of the U.S. Committee on Education and the Workforce."

Of course you do, because the numbers came from the Democratic staff. How does it compare to the numbers from the Republican staff? [silence][SIZE="1"]chirp chirp chirp[/SIZE][/silence] Oh that's right, the Republican staff doesn't give a shit about education and workforce.
A friend volunteers at the Food Bank on Cape Cod. Fully half the people coming in have been given a sheet by their employers listing the Food Bank, Welfare offices, Food Stamp(SNAP) services, Charities, Child Services, etc, so they can survive without getting a living wage.

It is very hard to nail down exact figures on any of this.

Very true, it's impossible to nail down exactly how badly we're getting screwed with the rabbit's warren of loopholes and moving targets. That's why it all estimates and averages, so it may be only 5 Billion or maybe 10 billion. We only know it's Billions, and it ain't right.

I hear plumbers are on the way up.

Plumbers have an advantage. Car breaks, buy a new one, no money down, 72 easy payments. Tooth breaks, chew on the other side until you can scrape up enough to buy a pair of pliers. Plumbing breaks, you need him right now. Of course the plumber's overhead has skyrocketed too, just insurance can run $hundreds a week.

And so, the marketplace of humanity: it's a terrible, cruel system, but nobody has figured out a better way.

But we had a better way in 1955, and we know what's changed in law and attitude.

xoxoxoBruce;949012 wrote:

But we had a better way in 1955, and we know what's changed in law and attitude.

Well said.

I wish someone would pay for my health care, heat, and food. I should quit a job or two.

:eyebrow:

You forgot the eyebrow. It's specified in the thread title. Your wish can't come true without it. I've posted one for you. You're welcome. :D

3F. I'm sorry to hear about your situation. I've been there. I've even lived in my vehicle at times. Keep your head up. Things do get better and one thing I learned is prayer works

Undertoad;949007 wrote:

I hear plumbers are on the way up.

These days everybody wants to go to college. Good plumbers need to do a little math, but if you can do a little math these days, you get a medium SAT and President Sanders sends you to college. And why not, I mean after that you get a nice cushy office job, in an air-conditioned office, instead of going through crawlspaces figuring out someone else's screwed-up installation.

I admit I don't know, but some people say the average age of skilled tradespeople is increasing and some people figure we are in for a shortage on the order of 3 million of 'em.

The value of the job is no longer communicated through society's respect; therefore, it will now be communicated through hourly rates. Wealth and usefulness to society are not correlated... right up to the moment you need your shit to go down the drain. At that point, someone's gonna have to get paid.

And so, the marketplace of humanity: it's a terrible, cruel system, but nobody has figured out a better way.

Plumbers around here in East Bumfuck get about 60-75 an hour. Of course they don't get paid for 40 hour weeks, a lot of time they are looking at jobs, invoicing, getting supplies, going to the job, etc.

But every trade around here has no, as in 0 the empty set, young workers. The youngest guys I've seen on a jobsite are late 20s early 30s and not too many of them. All the tradesmen have gray hair. All the kids want to do IT and write software.

infinite monkey;949058 wrote:

I wish someone would pay for my health care, heat, and food. I should quit a job or two.

Foreclosure is over-rated.