Finally. The TRUTH about the minimum wage.
Some demagogues charge that jobs at Wal-Mart and McDonald’s only pay the minimum wage. That’s plain wrong, as are many other things said about jobs that start at the minimum wage. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: Sixty-three percent of minimum wage workers receive raises within one year of employment, and only 15 percent still earn the minimum wage after three years. Moreover, only three percent of all hourly workers and two percent of wage and salary earners earn minimum wages. Most minimum wage earners are young—53 percent are between the ages of 16 and 24.
Furthermore, only 5.3 percent of minimum wage earners are from households below the official poverty line; 40 percent of minimum wage earners live in households with incomes of $60,000 and higher, and over 82 percent of minimum wage earners do not have dependents.
--Walter Williams
Why didn't Crash Kennedy and Coward Kerry give these stats?
A year or more ago, I had a conversation with a co-worker where min wage came up. He (along with aparently a lot of others) have this idea that minimum wage ought to be enough to get married and comfortably raise 2 kids on, 1 minimum wage. Not hardly. It's an unskilled introductory wage, HOPEFULLY moved away from soon as skills progress, for a single person without dependants, and that is all it should ever be (I am not a big supporter of the min wage by the way). If you are still earning minimum wage 2 or 3 years into a job, then you deserve it, period, that is all the value you provide to an employer.