Considering the fact that basic rent in in Seattle (judging by my recent search attempts) is 1,200 for the shittiest of places within an hour of the city. Health insurance is at least 400 a month for a healthcare plan that is basically worthless, but legally required (thanks Obamacare!)
That means you need to be making 19,200 (post-tax) to simply exist, legally, within an hour's drive of the city.
This doesn't cover utilities. It doesn't cover food. It doesn't cover transportation or other costs associated with actually having and maintaining a job.
Add food, with the
extremely generous assumption that you'll only spend 150 dollars a month on it, raises that up to 21,000. Assuming you only take public transportation, that's like to be, at a bare minimum, another 1,200, so 22,000.
If you're making 27,000, that gives you $6,000, best case, for an entire years of utilities, debt payments, medical costs (remember, a cheap plan like that means you'll be paying a lot out of pocket), etc. and so on.
It is most definitely "a little", although it means you might, if you're good at financial management and lucky with opportunities, slowly manage to get ahead in life. Why, only 50 years of this and you might even be able to afford the down payment on a house!
Of course, healthcare is subsidized now, so that at least is an improvement, so you might actually be getting a bit more since the government will be picking up a chunk of the tab there paying for your nearly useless plan. I believe you still have to pay the out of pocket costs associated with it though.
You guys don't need a higher minimum wage, you guys need a welfare state.
Yes, because we should have the general population of the state be on the hook for providing grasping businesses with heavily subsidized labour, held captive by the fact that if they leave their job or try to get a better job they will be punished by the state for it (and that is how attempts to implement "welfare" programs usually go, at least on this side of the pond). That's sure to be good for someone... somehow. I guess giving more money to rich people instead of, you know, actually require them to pay for the resources they benefit from, is somehow a good idea? Why should the taxpayers be on the hook for helping rich bastards avoid paying for the resources they utilize, when we can, instead, require them to actually pay for them?
I'm certainly not opposed to a state that supports its citizens, but raising the minimum wage is one of the more practical ways to do that with the fewest negative externalities, and is also much harder to abuse by those running the system to screw the poor and benefit the rich, the way traditional welfare tends to work.
The sort of welfare that actually helps people climb out of poverty isn't even popular in actual European welfare states, so there's not much chance of it happening here.
Actually, with minimum wage you'll have zero insurance costs, as a consequence of not having insurance.
This is illegal now!