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    Cost of Living?

    Originally posted by ThorsSon View Post
    to the tune of slightly better than half of minimum wage.
    What is minimum wage in the states? When I was a teen, we were at $8/hr in BC, but now...I think it's up to $10/hr. Up here in YK, it's....gosh, I don't even know. I get paid $18/hr to work retail, so it must be high. But everything is crazy expensive in the north.


    Mostly art.

    #2
    Re: Confessions

    Originally posted by volcaniclastic View Post
    What is minimum wage in the states? When I was a teen, we were at $8/hr in BC, but now...I think it's up to $10/hr. Up here in YK, it's....gosh, I don't even know. I get paid $18/hr to work retail, so it must be high. But everything is crazy expensive in the north.
    Depends on the state at the moment still. Florida's is 7.79 and servers (at least for me) is 4.91
    Always taking art commissions, especially for fantasy and pagan related artwork
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      #3
      Re: Confessions

      Federal min that states must equal or exceed is 7.25 I think. Different states go over. Servers are for some psychotic reason much lower.
      life itself was a lightsaber in his hands; even in the face of treachery and death and hopes gone cold, he burned like a candle in the darkness. Like a star shining in the black eternity of space.

      Yoda: Dark Rendezvous

      "But those men who know anything at all about the Light also know that there is a fierceness to its power, like the bare sword of the law, or the white burning of the sun." Suddenly his voice sounded to Will very strong, and very Welsh. "At the very heart, that is. Other things, like humanity, and mercy, and charity, that most good men hold more precious than all else, they do not come first for the Light. Oh, sometimes they are there; often, indeed. But in the very long run the concern of you people is with the absolute good, ahead of all else..."

      John Rowlands, The Grey King by Susan Cooper

      "You come from the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve", said Aslan. "And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth; be content."

      Aslan, Prince Caspian by CS Lewis


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        #4
        Re: Confessions

        Servers are lower based upon the assumption of tips is what i've always heard. I suppose that is why so many places figure the tip into the cost today.
        I'm Only Responsible For What I Say Not For What Or How You Understand!

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          #5
          Re: Confessions

          Originally posted by volcaniclastic View Post
          What is minimum wage in the states? When I was a teen, we were at $8/hr in BC, but now...I think it's up to $10/hr. Up here in YK, it's....gosh, I don't even know. I get paid $18/hr to work retail, so it must be high. But everything is crazy expensive in the north.
          $7.25 in Kansas. I worked with lead every day in a dirty warehouse for $11 to start.

          I worked outside, at night, walking door to door from November-February in Chicago for 6 hours a night and only got $8.

          Shit is bunk.
          No one tells the wind which way to blow.

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            #6
            Re: Confessions

            Originally posted by Yorin View Post
            Depends on the state at the moment still. Florida's is 7.79 and servers (at least for me) is 4.91
            But your price of food and gas is cheaper, so it makes up for it? I pay...$5.25/gallon for my fuel here.


            Mostly art.

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              #7
              Re: Confessions

              Again, price variez with location. I've never paid near that for gas but there are pricier states.
              life itself was a lightsaber in his hands; even in the face of treachery and death and hopes gone cold, he burned like a candle in the darkness. Like a star shining in the black eternity of space.

              Yoda: Dark Rendezvous

              "But those men who know anything at all about the Light also know that there is a fierceness to its power, like the bare sword of the law, or the white burning of the sun." Suddenly his voice sounded to Will very strong, and very Welsh. "At the very heart, that is. Other things, like humanity, and mercy, and charity, that most good men hold more precious than all else, they do not come first for the Light. Oh, sometimes they are there; often, indeed. But in the very long run the concern of you people is with the absolute good, ahead of all else..."

              John Rowlands, The Grey King by Susan Cooper

              "You come from the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve", said Aslan. "And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth; be content."

              Aslan, Prince Caspian by CS Lewis


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                #8
                Re: Confessions

                Originally posted by volcaniclastic View Post
                But your price of food and gas is cheaper, so it makes up for it? I pay...$5.25/gallon for my fuel here.
                Gas were I am (and I bet its higher than KS, since we have crazy high taxes) is about $3.10-$3.15 at the moment.

                I'm amazed how much prices can vary from place to place. In CA a house like mine ranges from $200K-$300K. We paid $140K. It's a BIG difference. In WI money goes a lot further.

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                  #9
                  Re: Confessions

                  Originally posted by Rowanwood View Post
                  Gas were I am (and I bet its higher than KS, since we have crazy high taxes) is about $3.10-$3.15 at the moment.

                  I'm amazed how much prices can vary from place to place. In CA a house like mine ranges from $200K-$300K. We paid $140K. It's a BIG difference. In WI money goes a lot further.
                  Same here. My house in Smithers was worth $200k, but the same house and property in Vancouver would have been worth 700k, and the house I live in now in the north is $700k, but would only be worth $100-200k down south.


                  Mostly art.

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                    #10
                    Re: Confessions

                    Originally posted by volcaniclastic View Post
                    But your price of food and gas is cheaper, so it makes up for it? I pay...$5.25/gallon for my fuel here.
                    Gas here is 3.10-3.25, depending where you are. Food is okay, particularly since we are one of the major ports in the US. Housing here starts around 150K for a crappy house in a bad neighborhood...sometimes you can get a deal though. Back home, where I'm from, these houses going for 150-250K would barely break 100.
                    Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of HistoryPagan Devotionals, because the wind and the rain is our Bible
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                      #11
                      Re: Confessions

                      Originally posted by MaskedOne View Post
                      Federal min that states must equal or exceed is 7.25 I think. Different states go over. Servers are for some psychotic reason much lower.
                      yeah, in the US, it's $7.25 on a federal level. But apparently that law doesn't apply for waiters/waitresses. they're dependent on tips to make minimum wage, but the consumers don't know that, and a lot of people don't seem to like tipping. people are stingy with their money. It's a really crappy system.

                      - - - Updated - - -

                      I worked in fast food last summer, and I knew someone who didn't get any tips at all one week. She was crying in the middle of the restaurant because she had made far less than minimum wage, and was unable to feed her children.

                      She was a manager. She was supposed to have been making more than me. Tell me that's not a messed up system, I DARE you.

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                        #12
                        Re: Confessions

                        I confess that every time I see a conversation like this I just get gladder and gladder that I am Australian.

                        Minimum wage here is $16.37 (according to Google) for a full-timer. Casuals get MORE, because they don't accrue holiday or sick pay. Trainees and apprentices get like $6.03, but that's because they are trainees and they are getting their qualification for free and they're teenagers. An adult trainee is still like $16.00 minimum.

                        The fact that Yorin only gets $4 something an hour as an adult in hospitality... that's absolutely insane. Even with tips (we don't tip in Australia as a standard... you can if you get outstanding service at a hotel or a fancy restaurant, but not as a standard). My cousin is a waitress and she gets paid like quadriple that.

                        Cost of living is more expensive here, but still. In Adelaide (which is considered a relatively cheap city in Aus) an average 3 bedroom family home in an average suburb will set you back $300-400K. In a dodgy suburb $250K. We pay $1120 a month rent for our 3 bedroom house. In Sydney it's more like $700K for the average.

                        But that's offset but things like healthcare. It costs me $30 to go to the doctor if I'm sick, and there are a lot of doctors who bulk bill, which means you pay nothing. Private health insurance costs us $140 a fortnight for BOTH of us, and that includes hospital cover.

                        - - - Updated - - -

                        Originally posted by Nightingale View Post
                        I worked in fast food last summer, and I knew someone who didn't get any tips at all one week. She was crying in the middle of the restaurant because she had made far less than minimum wage, and was unable to feed her children.

                        She was a manager. She was supposed to have been making more than me. Tell me that's not a messed up system, I DARE you.
                        Oh that is BEYOND messed up.

                        My sister is a 2IC manager at Hungry Jacks (Burger King) and she's supporting two small children with no help from their father, paying for childcare three days a week, renting a 2 bedroom flat and pretty much breaking even on a PART TIME wage. The $50 she gets from me a week for cleaning is for spending money... she doesn't NEED it, but it means she's got enough to spoil the kids and go out for dinner sometimes.

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                          #13
                          Re: Confessions

                          Originally posted by Rae'ya View Post
                          I confess that every time I see a conversation like this I just get gladder and gladder that I am Australian.

                          Minimum wage here is $16.37 (according to Google) for a full-timer. Casuals get MORE, because they don't accrue holiday or sick pay. Trainees and apprentices get like $6.03, but that's because they are trainees and they are getting their qualification for free and they're teenagers. An adult trainee is still like $16.00 minimum.

                          The fact that Yorin only gets $4 something an hour as an adult in hospitality... that's absolutely insane. Even with tips (we don't tip in Australia as a standard... you can if you get outstanding service at a hotel or a fancy restaurant, but not as a standard). My cousin is a waitress and she gets paid like quadriple that.

                          Cost of living is more expensive here, but still. In Adelaide (which is considered a relatively cheap city in Aus) an average 3 bedroom family home in an average suburb will set you back $300-400K. In a dodgy suburb $250K. We pay $1120 a month rent for our 3 bedroom house. In Sydney it's more like $700K for the average.

                          But that's offset but things like healthcare. It costs me $30 to go to the doctor if I'm sick, and there are a lot of doctors who bulk bill, which means you pay nothing. Private health insurance costs us $140 a fortnight for BOTH of us, and that includes hospital cover.
                          Thing is, are you really better off? A "dodgy" subdivision is 250K for 3 bedrooms? I live in a nice neighborhood, in a nice 4/5 bedroom house on 3/4 acre and it was 140K, maybe 170K with our improvements. I pay slightly less for insurance through my employer for 3 people, including health, dental, vision and life insurance.

                          It's relative.

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                            #14
                            Re: Confessions

                            Originally posted by Rowanwood View Post
                            Thing is, are you really better off? A "dodgy" subdivision is 250K for 3 bedrooms? I live in a nice neighborhood, in a nice 4/5 bedroom house on 3/4 acre and it was 140K, maybe 170K with our improvements. I pay slightly less for insurance through my employer for 3 people, including health, dental, vision and life insurance.

                            It's relative.
                            From what I've heard from hubby, who grew up in a poor family in Louisiana... yes, we're much better off here.

                            Housing is much more expensive, and food is more so. And yes, we have a poor class here and a rich class, but it seems to me that there isn't quite the same disparity between the poor class and the working class.

                            My point is that even with the cost of housing, we are pretty much living it up. It really only means that we have to rent longer before we can buy... and will be paying it off longer. But otherwise our weekly income is much higher than our spend, and we have plenty left over to put towards a house deposit. And neither of us have high paying jobs. I earn $25 an hour and hubby earns $21. That's not a low wage, but it's lower than a lot of occupations (especially considering my level of education and management status).

                            It's when you compare a low income Australian to a low income American that you start to see where the difference is.

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                              #15
                              Re: Confessions

                              Originally posted by Nightingale View Post
                              yeah, in the US, it's $7.25 on a federal level. But apparently that law doesn't apply for waiters/waitresses. they're dependent on tips to make minimum wage, but the consumers don't know that, and a lot of people don't seem to like tipping. people are stingy with their money. It's a really crappy system.
                              Shrug, stating my opinion of a number of customers on the public forums would require me to figure out a way to infract myself. Regarding them not knowing how low server minimum wage is, it's because they can't be bothered to read the oversized Department of Labor posters that are posted everywhere*. It was one of the first things I read when I started my first job and I tend to look in on em every couple years to see if anything has changed. I've known about the difference in minimum wage between server and most of the rest of the planet about as long as I've been working.

                              * I mean this almost literally. Most forms of workplace are required by law to have one somewhere that employees can see it.
                              life itself was a lightsaber in his hands; even in the face of treachery and death and hopes gone cold, he burned like a candle in the darkness. Like a star shining in the black eternity of space.

                              Yoda: Dark Rendezvous

                              "But those men who know anything at all about the Light also know that there is a fierceness to its power, like the bare sword of the law, or the white burning of the sun." Suddenly his voice sounded to Will very strong, and very Welsh. "At the very heart, that is. Other things, like humanity, and mercy, and charity, that most good men hold more precious than all else, they do not come first for the Light. Oh, sometimes they are there; often, indeed. But in the very long run the concern of you people is with the absolute good, ahead of all else..."

                              John Rowlands, The Grey King by Susan Cooper

                              "You come from the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve", said Aslan. "And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth; be content."

                              Aslan, Prince Caspian by CS Lewis


                              Comment

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