Working Class can’t afford the American Dream in Pittsburgh (Progress: health insurance, credit card)

[Pilot1]

Originally Posted by jfds

Those are middle class homes. A working class family may find it hard to save up enough for a down payment without sufficient savings.

How does someone save to buy a home if they have next to nothing left over at the end of the month?

Raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour is how we fix the problem.

Raising the minimum wage above the natural market for this type of labor will eliminated jobs these people need as businesses can no longer afford them.

[guy2073]

Raising the minimum wage will also raise prices accordingly, as a business owner, I have to pass on the prices to my customers.

[szug-bot]

Originally Posted by tyovan4

oooohhhh, a double-blasphemy!
Railing against minimum wage and saying some housing here is overpriced!



Omg, another double-blasphemy!
Suggesting that people look outside of the most holy, pure, and enlightened city of pittsburgh for their housing and suggesting that said city is in a housing bubble!

I need a "safe space" to recover from all of these microaggressions.

cracked me up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[BMan_152]

Originally Posted by tyovan4

And what about those of us who are already making $15/hour?

This is my big question too. As someone who makes around $15/hour now, all this will do is make my skilled job the new standard for minimum wage labor.

Yes people near the $15 mark might get a couple extra dollars to keep a bit differentiated from the minimum wage, but it will be nowhere near the near 50% required to keep the same quality of life once the economy changes to meet the new minimum wage.

[RogersParkTransplant]

For what it's worth, I see the debate as being much more about the obligation of corporations to share profits with workers at the bottom of the ladder -- there has to be a way to make clear that a small business owner making a modest profit is just not the same thing as a multimillion dollar corporation. Liberals like me love CostCo, for example, in part because they have sensible rules about decent wages for their workers, hiring practices that encourage promotion from within, and a relatively modest salary for the CEO. It shouldn't be about punishing the local contractor or coffee shop; still it's important for money to stay in local economies and for workers to be able to afford to live.

But still: I don't see what this really has to do with Pittsburgh.

[Paul2421]

Originally Posted by gladhands

LOL
https://www.redfin.com/PA/Pittsburgh.../home/74692086
https://www.redfin.com/PA/Pittsburgh.../home/73584508
https://www.redfin.com/PA/Pittsburgh.../home/73502527
https://www.redfin.com/PA/Pittsburgh.../home/74502788

but these statistics weren't pulled out of thin air. there are certainly houses that seems affordable to your standards compared to something in shadyside but do you really know the struggles of a working class person in today's economy? i doubt it.

[tyovan4]

Originally Posted by Pilot1

Raising the minimum wage above the natural market for this type of labor will eliminated jobs these people need as businesses can no longer afford them.

Originally Posted by guy2073

Raising the minimum wage will also raise prices accordingly, as a business owner, I have to pass on the prices to my customers.

More blasphemy.
Let me direct you to some educational resources:
https://www.amazon.com/Das-Kapital-C...ds=das+kapital
https://www.amazon.com/Communist-Man...nist+manifesto
https://www.amazon.com/Classic-Fairy...tale+anthology

Originally Posted by szug-bot

cracked me up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I try, I try.

Originally Posted by RogersParkTransplant

For what it's worth, I see the debate as being much more about the obligation of corporations to share profits with workers at the bottom of the ladder -- there has to be a way to make clear that a small business owner making a modest profit is just not the same thing as a multimillion dollar corporation. Liberals like me love CostCo, for example, in part because they have sensible rules about decent wages for their workers, hiring practices that encourage promotion from within, and a relatively modest salary for the CEO. It shouldn't be about punishing the local contractor or coffee shop; still it's important for money to stay in local economies and for workers to be able to afford to live.

Is not the way free-market capitalism?
We all have the resources available to us to be informed consumers. We can search for information about a company's social ethos, we can read reviews on Yelp, we can see reviews of how they treat their employees on Glassdoor.
It seems to me that you answered your own question. You found a business (CostCo) whose values you support. Therefore, you can choose to patronize their business instead of others, and contribute to their business success by giving them profit instead of their competitors. Their business successes, which you contributed to, will trickle down into what you view as social successes.

[gladhands]

Originally Posted by Paul2421

but these statistics weren't pulled out of thin air. there are certainly houses that seems affordable to your standards compared to something in shadyside but do you really know the struggles of a working class person in today's economy? i doubt it.

Maybe we should talk about what we're talking about. If you mean working poor, then say working poor. People with working-class careers like teachers and police officers can afford to buy homes in Pittsburgh. Two people working full-time at Aldi can afford to buy a house in Pittsburgh. Truth be told, you can find decent houses in safe neighborhoods for less than half of America's median home price

Count me among those who believe that we should have a living wage in this country. Unfortunately, we have people who currently earn a living wage and feel threatened by the prospect of people they deem beneath them also earning a living wage. You can see it right here in this thread. America has a wage problem and housing cost. Pittsburgh is easily one of the most affordable cities in the country, yet this thread seems to single it out as unaffordable.

[gladhands]

Also, allow me to say that this entire thread is dripping with entitlement. My parents were working poor, as were there for us. None of them owned a home. I believe all people should be able to raise their children in a safe neighborhood, but not everyone is entitled to home ownership, which is exactly what this thread is about. You want to be part of the landed gentry? Do better.

[Paul2421]

Originally Posted by gladhands

Maybe we should talk about what we're talking about. If you mean working poor, then say working poor. People with working-class careers like teachers and police officers can afford to buy homes in Pittsburgh. Two people working full-time at Aldi can afford to buy a house in Pittsburgh. Truth be told, you can find decent houses in safe neighborhoods for less than half of America's median home price

Count me among those who believe that we should have a living wage in this country. Unfortunately, we have people who currently earn a living wage and feel threatened by the prospect of people they deem beneath them also earning a living wage. You can see it right here in this thread. America has a wage problem and housing cost. Pittsburgh is easily one of the most affordable cities in the country, yet this thread seems to single it out as unaffordable.

I agree with you but I am just speaking about the statistics in the mentioned article, which do not follow your anecdotes. I'm not really sure what they count as the working class. Let's keep in mind here that teachers in pittsburgh make a median wage of 75k in many districts and police officers have been known to make into six figures. Aldi is also known to pay very well as they give jobs to college graduates starting at 70k.

your bootstraps mindset of "everyone can get by in pittsburgh" is just as out of touch.