Life at bottom of the wage scale

MUSKOGEE, Okla. — It's the kind of December evening when the Hosier family might want to stay home.

At work all day, John Hosier has been resting on the couch. Tina, his wife, has had her hands full taking care of their two young children. Yet, here they are, rolling 18-month-old Rose in a stroller with 5-year-old Donald tagging along, on a half-mile walk to the Salvation Army Church in Muskogee.

The Salvation Army's affiliated store offers discounted goods and employs Hosier full time. The $6-an-hour job is the family's sole paycheck, which amounts to barely $200 a week. Even with government aid, such as food stamps, the family is on poverty's doorstep.

Legislation to increase the federal minimum wage by $2.10 an hour is expected to clear the House today. The Senate will consider a version of the legislation next week.

The $5.15 an hour minimum wage would increase in three steps of 70 cents an hour each — 60 days, 14 months and 26 months after the legislation became law, eventually reaching $7.25.

The people who earn minimum, or close to it, are as different as John Hosier and Megan Sistanich.

She also lives in Muskogee but is still in high school. She's earning $5.15 an hour at a downtown cafe called Breadworks. She aims to go to a nearby college and become a pharmacist, which almost certainly would mean much better pay in a few years.

Serving behind the counter, taking orders for sandwiches and baked goods, is her first job. She's using the money for a cellphone and a coming band trip to Texas.

By one estimate, the expected increase would directly affect the paychecks of 6.6 million low-wage workers. Another 8 million workers have wages that, while a bit too high to be forced upward by the law, stand to gain from an upward ripple effect when the wage floor is adjusted.

A glimpse into the lives of people who live at bottom-rung pay rates illustrates why, to supporters of the change, the minimum wage is long overdue for a raise. But it also reveals that such a boost isn't a one-step solution for the challenges that face America's poorest workers.

In fact, many families are poor today even though they earn far above $7.25 an hour.

"Until you're making $10 or $12 an hour," if you're a single-income household with dependents, "you're going to have a really tough time making ends meet without public assistance," says David Blatt, a poverty expert at the Community Action Project of Tulsa County.

Of the workers who stand to reap higher pay if Congress raises the wage floor, the vast majority are adults, most work full time, and about 1 in 4 have dependent children, according to the Economic Policy Institute in Washington.

Moreover, they are often the sole breadwinner in the household. Of families with children, nearly half of those who would be affected by a minimum-wage increase get all their earned income from one low-wage worker.

The issue is important politically. Democrats, now in control of Congress, have made raising the minimum wage a top priority in their 100-hour legislative push for change. It would also have its most significant economic effect in the South and Great Plains where states generally haven't set their own higher minimum wage.

Few states will see a greater impact than Oklahoma. As of last year, the Sooner State led the nation in the share of hourly workers (4 percent) who earn no more than $5.15 per hour.

That means many families such as the Hosiers will see a boost in pay if the law changes. But it means that negative ripple effects will also be magnified, as businesses confront a big jump in labor costs. Many employers will have to raise prices, and some are likely to hire fewer people as a result.

A pay jump from $6 to $7.25 an hour would put 21 percent more money in each paycheck for Hosier.

A sturdy, soft-spoken man born in Arkansas, Hosier has spent about 15 years in this city of 39,000. He's worked as a mechanic on lawnmowers and other small motors. And for six years, he's been a "soldier" — a worker — at the Salvation Army. He rides a big truck, loading and unloading furniture, toys, boxes of clothing, and other items that county residents donate for sale in the store.

The Salvation Army is the core of this family's world. They don't have a car, but live within walking distance of both the church and the store where John works. The store is a source not only of a paycheck, but also of used goods available at deep discounts.

The family also gets substantial government aid, for everything from clothing to food and health care. But paying their bills is a stretch, the Hosiers say.

Rent is $400 a month for their modest, yellow-sided home. They've lived there just a few months, so they're still figuring out how much to budget for utilities. And medical costs add up each month.

Donald takes medicines to cope with hyperactivity, and Hosier lists a range of ailments of his own, from asthma to an ulcer.

The state's Medicaid program covers many of these health costs, but the medications all require small monthly copayments that add up, John says.

When they need to go on an errand, the Hosiers rely on a Volunteers of America van, or ride with friends and relatives.

Oklahoma, like the rest of the states, got its first taste of a federally mandated minimum wage in 1938, during Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal. It was 25 cents at the time — about $3.57 in today's dollars — and was adjusted upward, at infrequent intervals, in an effort to keep pace with rising costs of living.

The current level of $5.15 was reached in 1997, and Congress has never waited so long to raise it.

As a result, the purchasing power of a minimum-wage paycheck is now at its lowest point in half a century.

Information from Gannett News Service is included in this report.