Second cup of Coffee Talk

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No full-time minimum-wage worker can afford a 2-bedroom apartment in any US state

 

[scoutyjones2]

No full-time minimum-wage worker can afford a 2-bedroom apartment in any US state

They should get a one bedroom or share a house. Why is this news? I did this while saving to put myself thru college. Guess what, life is hard. Spend on needs, not wants

Also, this is misleading headline as the study cited is for rental HOME

 

[dash]

They should get a one bedroom or share a house. Why is this news? I did this while saving to put myself thru college. Guess what, life is hard. Spend on needs, not wants

Also, this is misleading headline as the study cited is for rental HOME

It's not really news and I agree that people need to look at available options if they find themselves in tough situations, just thought it was an interesting statistic.

 

[KennyBanyeah]

They should get a one bedroom or share a house. Why is this news? I did this while saving to put myself thru college. Guess what, life is hard. Spend on needs, not wants

Also, this is misleading headline as the study cited is for rental HOME

I get what you're saying but some minimum wage workers have families. I personally think that the minimum wage in both the US and Canada needs a hike. I think it's the right thing to do and it would stabilize our economies.

 

[jstewismybastardson]

They should get a one bedroom or share a house. Why is this news? I did this while saving to put myself thru college. Guess what, life is hard. Spend on needs, not wants

Also, this is misleading headline as the study cited is for rental HOME

every market is different but i empathize with the majority of young who are trying to crack into the housing market because it isnt the same as it was when I wanted to get into the housing market (and i bought when i was 30)

The needs versus wants thing is something the media focuses too much on imo ... they dont need to be trashed ... I dont think the average millenial is buying $400 jeans from Nordstrom that are made to look dirt stained ... the average millenial is turning away from cable (see other thread) and helping destroy crappy food chains like Applebees because they are making cost conscious decisions

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

I get what you're saying but some minimum wage workers have families. I personally think that the minimum wage in both the US and Canada needs a hike. I think it's the right thing to do and it would stabilize our economies.

This opens up a whole new can of worms but, family planning is important. Don't have kids you can't afford.

Re: minimum wage, Ontario is bumping up their minimum wage to $15 from $11.40 by 2019 (might get halted if the crooks lose next year's election but it'll already be up to $14 by then).

I obviously want to see people making more money but that idealism kinda conflicts with my not wanting to pay $4.00 for a cup of coffee or a bundle of bananas. It's expensive as shit to live here as it is. This doesn't help anybody, particularly those people who get an extra $3.50 an hour and then have to spend that on inflated living expenses.

I've always believed that the minimum wage should be pegged to inflation and programs should be in place (as they have been for years here) to help people move from low-paying jobs to ones more toward the median so they aren't working the cash line at McD's at 30.

 

[dash]

I obviously want to see people making more money but that idealism kinda conflicts with my not wanting to pay $4.00 for a cup of coffee or a bundle of bananas.

It's one of the reasons we are seeing a drastic increase in obesity and type II diabetes in young people. Good food is expensive, but crappy fast food is cheap and a lot of people have to make tough decisions. I'm with jstew, I empathize with the young people of today because it's way more expensive today than it was when I bought my first house in Calgary (like jstew when I was 30 years old).

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

every market is different but i empathize with the majority of young who are trying to crack into the housing market because it isnt the same as it was when I wanted to get into the housing market (and i bought when i was 30)

It's pretty bad out there (what's the affordable alternative to Vancouver? Red Deer?) but here what's happening is young people are starting to ditch Toronto for Kitchener, London, Hamilton (although Hamilton's almost caught up to Toronto in terms of affordability already), Niagara, shit even far-flung places like Thunder Bay. Which I don't think is too bad a thing.

 

[scoutyjones2]

every market is different but i empathize with the majority of young who are trying to crack into the housing market because it isnt the same as it was when I wanted to get into the housing market (and i bought when i was 30)

The needs versus wants thing is something the media focuses too much on imo ... they dont need to be trashed ... I dont think the average millenial is buying $400 jeans from Nordstrom that are made to look dirt stained ... the average millenial is turning away from cable (see other thread) and helping destroy crappy food chains like Applebees because they are making cost conscious decisions

Buying/owning a house isn't all it's cracked up to be...and their isn't a timetable/timeline for when you can or should be able to afford one.

Millenials are going into debt bigtime over college in the states and that is just stupid. They also have the latest greatest cell phones which his also stupid. Needs vs wants. Life is a balance of the 2. No one said it would be easy and it shouldn't be.

I am all for higher wages but that comes with downstream costs...

 

[jstewismybastardson]

It's pretty bad out there (what's the affordable alternative to Vancouver? Red Deer?) but here what's happening is young people are starting to ditch Toronto for Kitchener, London, Hamilton (although Hamilton's almost caught up to Toronto in terms of affordability already), Niagara, shit even far-flung places like Thunder Bay. Which I don't think is too bad a thing.

the affordable alternative here is (was?) probably Vancouver Island ... Victoria ... Nanaimo ... but that market is nuts now too

 

[scoutyjones2]

It's one of the reasons we are seeing a drastic increase in obesity and type II diabetes in young people. Good food is expensive, but crappy fast food is cheap and a lot of people have to make tough decisions. I'm with jstew, I empathize with the young people of today because it's way more expensive today than it was when I bought my first house in Calgary (like jstew when I was 30 years old).

good food isn't expensive...make your own and stop buying processed shit. get your face out of your phone and take a walk, bike ride, meet people face to face. put down the video games and interact with the world and people OUTSIDE

 

[jstewismybastardson]

It's one of the reasons we are seeing a drastic increase in obesity and type II diabetes in young people. Good food is expensive, but crappy fast food is cheap and a lot of people have to make tough decisions. I'm with jstew, I empathize with the young people of today because it's way more expensive today than it was when I bought my first house in Calgary (like jstew when I was 30 years old).

we're in extreme markets but i buy at 338K in 2003 and my house is now assessed at 1,884K now?

no university grad turned professional (let alone a family with earners making minimum wage) is entering the realm of home ownership today in this market

 

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we're in extreme markets but i buy at 338K in 2003 and my house is now assessed at 1,884K now?

no university grad turned professional (let alone a family with earners making minimum wage) is entering the realm of home ownership today in this market

First house I bought in Calgary in 1994 was as 1800 sq ft bungalow in a pretty nice neighborhood in NW Calgary for 118 grand. Those were the days.

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

It's one of the reasons we are seeing a drastic increase in obesity and type II diabetes in young people. Good food is expensive, but crappy fast food is cheap and a lot of people have to make tough decisions. I'm with jstew, I empathize with the young people of today because it's way more expensive today than it was when I bought my first house in Calgary (like jstew when I was 30 years old).

I bought my first place (new build townhouse, 2 bedrooms 2 baths, right in the city) at 26 and closed at 28. Since 26 I've gotten married and have kids on my mind and want to get a house, backyard, the whole suburban family bit.

The value of my place is good but the housing in the surrounding cities that would be viable for me have almost doubled in value in the past 5 years and there's a good chance I just won't be able to make it all work.

My wife and I both make good money and there's just no reason that should be the reality but it is.

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

the affordable alternative here is (was?) probably Vancouver Island ... Victoria ... Nanaimo ... but that market is nuts now too

Yup. I started typing Victoria but then remembered reading something then confirmed it via google that it's now the "least affordable small city in Canada".

Bound to happen I guess.

 

[Comeds]

Nice, conversation. I don't agree with everyone but no labels or insults are being thrown about. Nice.

Scouty - go fuck yourself

My two cents, in the US if health care was truly affordable then the minimum wage would not need a drastic hike.

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

good food isn't expensive...make your own and stop buying processed shit. get your face out of your phone and take a walk, bike ride, meet people face to face. put down the video games and interact with the world and people OUTSIDE

Food is much more expensive here than it is there, FWIW.

Things in Canada are always overpriced compared to their American counterparts (thus jstew's garbage bags of Washingtonian gasoline and milk) and to top it off our taxes are higher overall than most states, both income and sales.

Which is why when people go on about Canada's healthcare system being so great I cringe.

 

[Darkstone42]

good food isn't expensive...make your own and stop buying processed shit. get your face out of your phone and take a walk, bike ride, meet people face to face. put down the video games and interact with the world and people OUTSIDE

Good food also takes time, and a lot of these folks are working multiple jobs to provide for their families. And not all of them started those families while poor--a layoff or a divorce or a medical emergency or some other unexpected event may have pulled the rug out from under them.

Heck, I'm a graduate student who makes enough to live on (especially since I'm still on my parents' cell phone plan, don't own a car, and get health insurance through the school), but the time sink of graduate school makes it hard to cook for myself every night like I would prefer. I'm a good cook, and just about everything I make tastes better than what I could get at a restaurant, and it gives me the freedom to control what I eat, but when I do a 12-hour day in the lab, it's just not possible to find the time to make myself a meal.

That becomes far more difficult when you lose the freedom I have to decide when to go home because you have to show up for your scheduled shifts or get fired. It's hard on me, it's impossible for some folks.

 

[dash]

the affordable alternative here is (was?) probably Vancouver Island ... Victoria ... Nanaimo ... but that market is nuts now too

My wife's uncle passed away about six weeks ago and the place he bought in Arbutus Ridge (Cobble Hill area between Victoria and Nanaimo) back in 2002 cost 250 grand. We listed it at 469 grand about two weeks ago and it wasn't even on the market for 2 days before we had three offers (all over list place). We accepted an offer for 478 grand.

 

[Darkstone42]

But the real problem is that prices have gone up through inflation, but wages have not. Now, we're stuck in this tough spot because bringing wages up to match current prices could shock our economy, but not doing so makes it nearly impossible for some folks to provide for themselves and their families.

On top of which, companies are getting away with unpaid internships, which take high-skill workers out of the workforce and don't compensate them for their abilities and productivity. So now workers with hirable skills who could and should be making money they could feed back into the economy, increasing demand for products and offsetting the impact of raising wages for businesses to keep costs reasonable, are getting stuck in positions where they're doing work and not getting paid for it.

So we're stuck with the challenge of doing three things at once:
1) Making sure everyone has the opportunity to make a living wage.
2) Making sure everyone gets fairly compensated for their labor in high-skill positions.
3) Doing 1) and 2) without shocking the economy and skyrocketing prices to offset the benefits of folks making more money, which means decoupling the effects somehow.

What a fine mess we're in.