WTF is going on? Do fast wood workers legitimately think they deserve this?
Fast-food workers in dozens of cities are rallying Wednesday, demanding a $15 hourly wage for their work.
They're joined in some cases by home-care aides, retail clerks and other low-wage workers who often earn closer to the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour than their stated goal.
But is $15 an hour a realistic demand?
At first blush, it seems a real stretch.
A $15 an hour federal pay floor would represent a 107% increase in the minimum wage. The largest-ever one-time increase to the minimum wage was 88%. That occurred in 1951 when the federal minimum jumped to 75 cents an hour from 40 cents.
The last minimum-wage increase, phased in over three years through 2009, was a 41% increase to the current rate from $5.15 an hour.
At $15 an hour, protesters are also demanding a 57% increase from the $9.53 an hour wage a non-manager, fast-food worker averaged in February.
To put that in perspective, it took 18 years for fast-food workers to see a similar percentage from the $6.10 an hour they earned at the start of 1998, according to the Labor Department.
So who currently makes $15 an hour?
In 2014, brickmasons earned an average wage of $15.12 an hour, according to theLabor Department. Pharmacy technicians averaged $14.95 an hour, and various categories of assemblers and production workers-typical factory jobs-earned between $14.78 and $15.25 an hour. Each of those jobs would generally require more skill and training that an entry-level position at a restaurant.
If all workers earned at least $15 an hour, there would be a ripple effect through hundreds of occupations. Some workers would likely see raises. Others could lose their jobs to automation or overseas competitors.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated an increase in the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour would cost the U.S. about 500,000 jobs. Many economists believe the impact of $15 an hour would be much larger.
And while restaurant workers wages are rising faster than pay increases in the broader economy, wage gains have generally been muted. Average hourly earnings for all workers was $24.86 last month, up a mild 2.1% from a year earlier.
But there are several reasons that $15 an hour may not be such a reach.
San Francisco, Seattle and the airport suburb of SeaTac, Wash., have already established minimum wages of $15 an hour, though it will take a few years to reach that rate in the larger cities.
If lawmakers and voters in those places view $15 as a living wage, other cities could soon follow.
The cost of living in Seattle is about 21% higher than the rest of the country, according to the Census Bureau.
But a number of large cities are similarly as expensive, including Baltimore, Boston,Chicago and San Diego. And Seattle is a comparative deal versus Los Angeles, New York and Washington.
Some, including Chicago and Washington, have established higher minimum wages, but lawmakers there stopped short of $15 an hour.
There is also clear momentum for a higher minimum wage at the state level. Less than half of states still follow the federal wage. Last year, 14 states acted to raise their minimum wages, with Massachusetts setting the nation's highest rate at $11 an hour by 2017.
Several more states, including Colorado, New York and Oregon, are considering changes to their pay-floor laws. A proposed ballot initiative in Oregon would seek to raise that state's minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2018, from the current $9.25 an hour rate.
Beyond law changes, large employers, including McDonalds, Wal-Mart and Target have all pledged to increase starting pay for workers to well above the federal minimum wage.
While promises to lift workers to $10 an hour is far short of the $15 goal, it suggests the federal mandate is no longer sufficient to attract workers even for the lowest-skilled jobs.
Other companies have already established pay floors above $15 an hour.
The health insurance company Aetna Inc. said in January that it would raise wages for its lowest-paid employees to at least $16 an hour.
Gravity Payments, a credit card processing company in Seattle, announced this week that it would pay all its workers at least $70,000 annually, which breaks down to about $35 an hour.
Fast-food workers in dozens of cities are rallying Wednesday, demanding a $15 hourly wage for their work.
They're joined in some cases by home-care aides, retail clerks and other low-wage workers who often earn closer to the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour than their stated goal.
But is $15 an hour a realistic demand?
At first blush, it seems a real stretch.
A $15 an hour federal pay floor would represent a 107% increase in the minimum wage. The largest-ever one-time increase to the minimum wage was 88%. That occurred in 1951 when the federal minimum jumped to 75 cents an hour from 40 cents.
The last minimum-wage increase, phased in over three years through 2009, was a 41% increase to the current rate from $5.15 an hour.
At $15 an hour, protesters are also demanding a 57% increase from the $9.53 an hour wage a non-manager, fast-food worker averaged in February.
To put that in perspective, it took 18 years for fast-food workers to see a similar percentage from the $6.10 an hour they earned at the start of 1998, according to the Labor Department.
So who currently makes $15 an hour?
In 2014, brickmasons earned an average wage of $15.12 an hour, according to theLabor Department. Pharmacy technicians averaged $14.95 an hour, and various categories of assemblers and production workers-typical factory jobs-earned between $14.78 and $15.25 an hour. Each of those jobs would generally require more skill and training that an entry-level position at a restaurant.
If all workers earned at least $15 an hour, there would be a ripple effect through hundreds of occupations. Some workers would likely see raises. Others could lose their jobs to automation or overseas competitors.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated an increase in the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour would cost the U.S. about 500,000 jobs. Many economists believe the impact of $15 an hour would be much larger.
And while restaurant workers wages are rising faster than pay increases in the broader economy, wage gains have generally been muted. Average hourly earnings for all workers was $24.86 last month, up a mild 2.1% from a year earlier.
But there are several reasons that $15 an hour may not be such a reach.
San Francisco, Seattle and the airport suburb of SeaTac, Wash., have already established minimum wages of $15 an hour, though it will take a few years to reach that rate in the larger cities.
If lawmakers and voters in those places view $15 as a living wage, other cities could soon follow.
The cost of living in Seattle is about 21% higher than the rest of the country, according to the Census Bureau.
But a number of large cities are similarly as expensive, including Baltimore, Boston,Chicago and San Diego. And Seattle is a comparative deal versus Los Angeles, New York and Washington.
Some, including Chicago and Washington, have established higher minimum wages, but lawmakers there stopped short of $15 an hour.
There is also clear momentum for a higher minimum wage at the state level. Less than half of states still follow the federal wage. Last year, 14 states acted to raise their minimum wages, with Massachusetts setting the nation's highest rate at $11 an hour by 2017.
Several more states, including Colorado, New York and Oregon, are considering changes to their pay-floor laws. A proposed ballot initiative in Oregon would seek to raise that state's minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2018, from the current $9.25 an hour rate.
Beyond law changes, large employers, including McDonalds, Wal-Mart and Target have all pledged to increase starting pay for workers to well above the federal minimum wage.
While promises to lift workers to $10 an hour is far short of the $15 goal, it suggests the federal mandate is no longer sufficient to attract workers even for the lowest-skilled jobs.
Other companies have already established pay floors above $15 an hour.
The health insurance company Aetna Inc. said in January that it would raise wages for its lowest-paid employees to at least $16 an hour.
Gravity Payments, a credit card processing company in Seattle, announced this week that it would pay all its workers at least $70,000 annually, which breaks down to about $35 an hour.
