Minimum wage is not the same thing as a living wage. The minimum wage should be a living wage, but it isn’t.
See: NY. We just got our minimum wage increase and it’s 15-16/hr depending on where you are in NY… That’s what we were fighting for more than ten goddamn years ago. $15-$16/hr is an absolute joke on Long Island and NYC. I finally managed to claw my way up to 60k/year and as a single guy the thought of homeownership on long Island is as fantastical and far-fetched as a unicorn, forget about 15/hr… You can’t even rent most illegal apartments at that income alone.
The conversation needs to be about what constitutes a living wage and how to calculate it at a given time for each area not just blanket minimum wage increases to specific numbers that sound nice to chant like “fight for fifteen.”