Matter of Opinion

Mon., Jan. 7, 2008

Minimum wage and history

Dave Oliveria has an interesting question over at Huckleberries Online. What's the lowest wage you worked for?

For me, it was $1.50 an hour. I was 14.

This graphic shows the buying power of a minimum wage salary through the years. The high point was $1.60 an hour in 1968. Check the graphic to see if your lowest wage translates to something that is better than today's minimum wage, which is:

* $8.07 an hour in Washington state.
* $5.85 in Idaho, which is the same as the federal rate.

That $1.60 in 1968 is equivalent to $9.47 today. You can use this calculator to adjust your lowest salary for inflation.

My $1.50 translates to $8.15 today. So at age 14, I was making more than an adult does with the minimum wage in Washington by 8 cents an hour and by over 2 bucks an hour in Idaho.

Posted Jan. 7, 2008, 4:07 p.m.

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