If we used simple inflation numbers, we would be sitting at $10-$11/hour, and if we project it out a few more years given inflation spikes $15/hr just on the metric by the end of the decade is achievable.

But let me add a page to the playbook of management, and this has nothing to do with political affiliation. Productivity measures.

They use them for how productive workers are but never for wage increases. If you included those numbers in with the math, then it would be easier to achieve the cost for labor we talk too.

Now there will be a problem with this that some folks may not realize if this is achieved.

Businesses pay 1/2 of the federal/state taxes that people pay usually. So if you take that with the push for higher taxes on corporations (which I don't see as a bad thing), the cost of good will go up massively.

Or

Businesses will do what they do, which is get out of business in low profit areas. Then those workers that have jobs in areas where money is made, are unemployed and then the labor shortage is averted.

Then the government has a real issue on it's hand as the cost of good are high and business creation stops. Most folks especially in urban centers have not seen this played out before, I have and anyone with history in the Midwest knows this very very well.

So there has to be a balance and smart investment and of course reasonable living wages. The problem is businesses will raise the cost of all goods including food to where the $25/hr you wish for will be eaten up by inflation.

Does that mean we shouldn't fight for it? No. But folks better understand having a job is a privilege and not a right, and if they find employers doing the right thing, they need to fight for them hard.

That and also fighting companies that use slave labor which is predominantly most goods made in Asia. One can't be pro-free trade at this moment and pro-America for living wages.

Without any changes, folks should expect inflation to bump at 10% for the rest of the decade. This means everything you see here and now should double in price for the same thing, or the quantity purchased reduced. Meanwhile the salaries will be based on COLA which is not covered by fuel, food, or shelter.

Whose fault is this really? The Baby Boomers. They didn't save enough, they supported governments both DNC and GOP that ran huge deficits. Lastly, they didn't reproduce enough. So now we either take care of them or the children and our generation. Guess what, we are are in charge now ...