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Comment by autobodie

2 days ago

It's literally called a "living" wage, and I guarantee you in reality it's nothing more than that, if even. Life tends to always have unexpected costs. I shouldn't need to tell anybody that, including you.

> it's nothing more than that, if even

How do you characterize the poverty line, since it's much much lower?

The entire point of the term "living wage" is that it's fine. Yes including the ability to save up for unexpected costs.

  • Indeed. The independently calculated Living Wage in my country (as opposed to the government's "Living Wage" which is just a minimum wage law with better branding) is actually very slightly higher than my average annual expenditure when I last checked.

    Most people wouldn't want to live like me (I don't drink, I don't holiday abroad, I don't have kids, or expensive hobbies), but I prefer this. Also, some of the discrepancy is explained by the annoying "Being poor is expensive" where I can make choices that are cheaper over the long term but would be ruinously expensive for a poor person.

>It's literally called a "living" wage, and I guarantee you in reality it's nothing more than that

Did you read the methodology page or even my comment? I made specific objections with the methodology and you didn't even address them.

>Life tends to always have unexpected costs. I shouldn't need to tell anybody that, including you.

I shouldn't have to tell you that if you read the methodology page, you'd see there's a specific category for "Other necessities" and "Civic engagement" (whatever that means), and I'm not objecting to those categories.