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It seems to me, in my travels, that places where there are high-paying jobs always have a higher COL, and that low COL areas mostly have lower paying jobs.
I have friends and relatives who earn extremely high salaries, in each case they live and work in cities with very expensive homes, high taxes and high COL.
In my retirement, we settled in a low COL area. In our town the per-capita income is $10k. There are nearby towns where per-capita incomes are as low as $8k/year. My pension is really close to the current Minimum-Wage, and yet our household income puts us in the upper 40% income households in our town / area. You may consider me 'low income', but it does not feel poor when we live in a community that has such a low COL.
If the Minimum-Wage doubles, I am concerned about the effect on the COL.
If the Minimum-Wage goes up my pension will not change, everyone's pensions and SS will remain the same.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
44,585 posts, read 81,206,701 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Submariner
It seems to me, in my travels, that places where there are high-paying jobs always have a higher COL, and that low COL areas mostly have lower paying jobs.
I have friends and relatives who earn extremely high salaries, in each case they live and work in cities with very expensive homes, high taxes and high COL.
In my retirement, we settled in a low COL area. In our town the per-capita income is $10k. There are nearby towns where per-capita incomes are as low as $8k/year. My pension is really close to the current Minimum-Wage, and yet our household income puts us in the upper 40% income households in our town / area. You may consider me 'low income', but it does not feel poor when we live in a community that has such a low COL.
If the Minimum-Wage doubles, I am concerned about the effect on the COL.
If the Minimum-Wage goes up my pension will not change, everyone's pensions and SS will remain the same.
You are right about cost of living and good jobs. Where I live now the median family income is $152,000. What would usually be minimum wage workers at the few businesses here are driving or taking the bus in from other areas. In order to attract them these places like (Taco Bell and McDonalds) are starting at $13/hour. The free market is working as it should. When we retire in 4-6 years, we will definitely be moving to a lower cost area, where our pensions, SS and other investments will go farther, and we can get out of the current $7,000/year property tax bill. Like you, our income will not go up with a minimum wage increase, our only way to increase it is to work more years or get a significant raise very soon.
It seems to me, in my travels, that places where there are high-paying jobs always have a higher COL, and that low COL areas mostly have lower paying jobs.
I have friends and relatives who earn extremely high salaries, in each case they live and work in cities with very expensive homes, high taxes and high COL.
In my retirement, we settled in a low COL area. In our town the per-capita income is $10k. There are nearby towns where per-capita incomes are as low as $8k/year. My pension is really close to the current Minimum-Wage, and yet our household income puts us in the upper 40% income households in our town / area. You may consider me 'low income', but it does not feel poor when we live in a community that has such a low COL.
If the Minimum-Wage doubles, I am concerned about the effect on the COL.
If the Minimum-Wage goes up my pension will not change, everyone's pensions and SS will remain the same.
I wonder, too. For example, would rents skyrocket all of a sudden? Since chances are MW workers don't own homes (and not sure they could on $15.00 an hour), I think landlords everywhere would really gouge rentals.
I wonder, too. For example, would rents skyrocket all of a sudden? Since chances are MW workers don't own homes (and not sure they could on $15.00 an hour), I think landlords everywhere would really gouge rentals.
I wonder, too. For example, would rents skyrocket all of a sudden? Since chances are MW workers don't own homes (and not sure they could on $15.00 an hour), I think landlords everywhere would really gouge rentals.
If your city / state does not have rent-control, then rents will certainly go up 10% / year, to level out at twice the current rent levels.
I spent about 27 years as landlord with apartment buildings, in various states.
My grandparents taught me that if you never raise the rent you get loyal renters. But coming out of the Great Depression they had a different ethic.
In all of my time in dealing with renters and rubbing elbows with other landlords, it is pretty much the accepted norm to bump rent every year. Many landlords will raise the rent a bit every year until the tenant leaves. Then drop it again for the next tenant. In each city rent levels float like that. Depending on the tenant's income a tenant will be squeezed by increasing rent, until the point where they search for a different apartment. Rent levels will go up and down within a specific building. Rent levels within a community will find an average according to the average wages in that community.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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In our area rent has been going up much more than 10%, in fact some cases over 100%, though the average is 45% increase over 2010 rents. Landlords charge what they can get, and with so many people looking for rentals and not enough to go around it's the landlord's opportunity to make money. a minimum wage of $15 won't make much difference, even at $15 those workers cannot afford to rent here without roommates. If it causes higher pay workers to get increases to maintain their distance from minimum wage, it would probably drive rent up even more.
In our area rent has been going up much more than 10%, in fact some cases over 100%, though the average is 45% increase over 2010 rents.
2010 to 2016 is six years. If each apartment's rent went up 10% / year, every year. and after 4 years the tenant left so the rent was dropped 20% at that point. You would be very near to 45% in 5 or 6 years.
Quote:
... Landlords charge what they can get, and with so many people looking for rentals and not enough to go around it's the landlord's opportunity to make money
I agree.
Quote:
... a minimum wage of $15 won't make much difference, even at $15 those workers cannot afford to rent here without roommates. If it causes higher pay workers to get increases to maintain their distance from minimum wage, it would probably drive rent up even more.
I agree that the biggest beneficiaries of a $15/hour minimum wage may be landlords. Initially C&D properties but it will percolate rent prices up to the higher levels too.
One reason is it may allow those that are living at home or sharing households to get their own apartment squeezing already low vacancy markets . Additionally, It will allow some latitude by the landlords to raise the rents without the tenant leaving, perhaps to move back home or into a shared household.
Whenever money is given to the bottom of the working class, it always leaves their hands just as fast. The nice way to say it is; it goes back into the economy. The only question is, who is going to get it. Landlords won't be the only ones.
The ones that will get hurt the most will likely be the middle class as their salaries may not rise but all the products they buy and rent do
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