What is a minimum wage, really?
The year was 1965 and my 16th birthday was rapidly approaching in the month of March. My mother and I used to frequent what would be called a “convenience store” in today’s world, located on Morrell Avenue in the city of Connellsville near Greenwood Heights. The owners of the store were a husband and wife team that lived above their place of business. This store served local residents from the Wheeler and Morrell areas of Dunbar Township, in addition to the nearby homes and apartments along Morrell Avenue in Connellsville.
While shopping at the store one day, I saw a sign near the cash register that said, “stock boy” wanted. I became interested in the job and talked to my mother about applying for the position. Previously, I had been a paperboy providing home delivery for the local newspaper for the last three and a half years. I was earning 1.5 cents per paper through Saturday’s, and my route of 65 included an area known as Brookvale extending up W. Crawford Avenue down to Wood Street and the West Green Street area located in Connellsville. For a little over an hour a day, I could earn close to $6 per week providing this service to local residents. This was my spending money for the week.
After some discussion with the owners of the store, I filled out an application for the job and learned I would have to obtain a work permit since I was under age 18. I would be allowed to work between the hours of 4-9 p.m., and no more than 20 hours a week during the school year. I would make 85 cents an hour and could earn $17 weekly. Thus, I would make $4.25 every night I worked. You can only imagine how happy I was to make almost as much in one day as I had been making in an entire week of carrying newspapers!
Unfortunately for me, when I received my first paycheck I only cleared $11.90. I did not know about payroll deductions being taken out of what I earned. If you do the math that worked out to about 60 cents an hour! I was actually earning less than what I was paid as a paperboy! Once I turned 16 and school was out for the summer, an offer was made as follows: work four nights a week for six hours and get paid regular wages. Work Saturday and Sunday from 2-10 and get paid in cash with no taxed deducted. We jumped at the opportunity to make the extra cash over the summer months. What we didn’t know was we should have been paid a minimum wage of $1 an hour for everything we worked since the day I started. We were being shortchanged by the owners the entire time we worked for them. Someone turned them into “Wage and Labor” and they had to reimburse us over a $100 each in back pay for their failure to follow the laws.
What’s the moral of this story? If any of today’s politicians think that a minimum wage of $7.25 an hour is sufficient to support a family, they are poorly informed. The six states closest to Pennsylvania pay their employees a minimum wage as follows; Ohio $8.55 an hour; West Virginia $8.75 an hour along with Delaware; Maryland and New Jersey $10 an hour; and New York $11 an hour.
After payroll taxes are deducted from a worker’s paycheck in Pennsylvania for a 40-hour pay period, they will be lucky to clear $200 a week and that equals $5 an hour.
Do you call that a livable and sustainable minimum wage? No one can possibly pay for a place to live, their utility bills and purchase food on this meager wage. Health insurance, good luck with that. Our workers at least deserve $9.50 to $10 as a minimum wage based on the other states around us. You can’t blame people for leaving Pennsylvania and finding work elsewhere.
Since our Republican legislators control our state government, it’s time for Representatives Dowling, Warner and State Senator Stefano to step up and submit legislation to raise our minimum wage in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to at least $10 per hour.聽
Just for your information, I have never received a (COLA), Cost of Living Adjustment since I retired over twelve years ago. Every year, I am forced to pay more for everything, but our state government does not see fit to provide this financial assistance to our oldest and most needy retired educators. You as state legislators have been getting cost of living adjustments from your fellow politicians for many years. When is this going to be fair and equitable for all former retired state employees that are not involved with the state legislature?
Terry J. Boors is a resident of Connellsville