Zach Anderson's blog postings about 30 Days Making Minimum Wage

1. I think Senator Ted Kennedy’s argument that minimum wage should be raised is absolutely correct. As the film clearly showed, the fact that minimum wage is so low means that people making that amount of money have little to no means by which to pay for all of the basic expenses of living (i.e. rent, gas and electricity, food and water, clothes, and more). Morgan was working two jobs, making slightly more than minimum wage, Alex was also working, and they couldn’t pay all their expenses. Our working poor have absolutely no chance for survival, much less success with minimum wage as low as it is. In response to the argument from politicians and businesses against raising minimum wage, that doing so would cause companies to go bankrupt, the raising of minimum wage by a few dollars at least would not bankrupt the companies. For example, a company like McDonalds pays most of it’s workers minimum wage or just above. They are a multi-trillion dollar company, having to pay its workers a few extra dollars an hour wouldn’t bankrupt them. Also, but as the cost of living rises, if minimum wage stays the same, more and more people aren’t going to be able to spend money. Thus, the same companies that were against raising minimum wage are going to lose millions of customers as more people are falling below the poverty line.

2. I think the underlying feeling that caused Morgan and Alex to argue over finances was stress. Alex especially, was very conscientious about the fact that they had no money to spend on anything but the necessities. When Morgan spent money on the kids, she got upset because they couldn’t afford to do that. She saw that both her and Morgan were working very hard, and just barely making ends meet. When he spent money, that stressed her out over where the money that they would need to pay the bills would come from. It’s no surprise to me that they would be stressed out. With minimum wage being as low as it is, there’s no room for people to spend money carelessly, and people stress over how in the world they are going to survive with their sanity.