Washington state has the second highest minimum wage in the nation. Simultaneously, Seattle hosts the third largest homeless population of any U.S. city. For Liberty students, this striking discrepancy illustrates the reality of the economy they are about to step into.
Recently, Renton and Unincorporated King County minimum wages jumped to over $20 per hour, a number most teachers at Liberty couldn’t have dreamt of earning in their youth. Even to students making $16.66 while working in municipalities like Issaquah, the idea of earning $20 is still quite impressive. However, when put in perspective, this number isn’t as high as it first appears.
“The cost of living and the cost of tuition has far outpaced the rise in minimum wage,” Liberty Honors English teacher Henry Level, who had his first job in the early 2000s, said. “$20 is a big jump from $15 a few years ago, but that’s only, I hope, catching up to the gap that was there.”
With prices of both living and education rising, that $20 doesn’t go as far as one might think. Not so long ago, teens could work over the summer and pay for a semester or two of college. Now, that idea is almost laughable.
Former Liberty student Sofia Boulton, who moved to Texas where minimum wage is only $7.25, began working at 16 to attempt to save enough to afford university tuition by the time she graduates.
“I work about 35 hours a week. I get home from school at 2:30 and then I go and work 7 hour shifts. I save 80% of everything I earn for college,” Boulton said.
For students like Boulton who hope to earn and save up money through a job, the record-high minimum wage around Liberty looks fantastic on paper. However, it has had unintended and unseen consequences on some of the high school labor force.
A high minimum wage also means high operating costs for businesses, who are increasingly prioritizing entry-level jobs for the individuals who rely most on the money, such as those providing for families or facing unstable living conditions.
Following a budget cut at Banana Republic due to the minimum wage increase, senior Lily Antin found that she could only work every other week, half of the hours she clocked previously.
“Because I’m a high schooler, and I’m just there to work, I’m not that valued by my employer,” Antin said.
While a minimum wage increase results in higher hourly pay, it holds less value if employees see their hours cut, especially to the high school students who have traditionally filled many of these positions for nonessential income.
“Coming into this year, finding a job was hard. I got rejected from many places I applied to—around 20 to 30 jobs,” Antin said. “We’re going to see high schoolers struggling to find jobs because the minimum wage is so high now, and teenagers aren’t the reason minimum wage was increased.”
The push to raise the minimum wage to a living wage can result in a lack of jobs for individuals who aren’t seen as needing one, threatening the long-standing culture of the teenage job.
With the low availability of hours and the high cost of college, gas, and housing, financing their future independently seems implausible for many high schoolers, which is why it’s no surprise that the percentage of employed students has decreased over the past several decades.
“When I was in high school, a lot of my friends worked, even if it was just for a couple hours a week,” AP Human Geography and Sociology teacher Brittany Fannon said.
Now, most students say that while not uncommon to have a job, the majority of their friends do not formally work, especially as Sophomores and Juniors. In the late 1990s, nearly 35% of high-schoolers also held jobs. Today, that number is just over 20%.
This isn’t necessarily a reflection of laziness from Gen-Z, but rather a shift in both the accessibility of teenage jobs and what can realistically be earned through them. Now, many students instead dedicate themselves to intense extracurriculars or passion projects that prepare them for their future careers in ways that don’t involve paid jobs. Given the difficulties in affording college with a job, opting to spend time completing challenging course work, volunteering, interning, building clubs, playing sports, and more in order to earn scholarships, sometimes pays off more than dedicating oneself to a job.
This shift in deciding to hone in on field-specific extracurriculars rather than work at McDonalds or Starbucks also reflects the growing idea that Gen Z is more focused on passion and fulfillment than monetary status.
“After high school I’ll have to do at least 6 years of school to have my dream job of a marine biologist, and I’m definitely not doing it for the money. I’ve always cared about the environment and want to go into it despite the pay,” junior Megan Smith said.
Regardless, it is agreed that minimum wage remains an integral part in maintaining fairness and equality within a capitalist economic system, whether those working are adults or high school students entering the workforce.
“The bigger picture is that things have gotten so expensive that this generation, people in highschool or in their 20s are really frozen out of the ability to start off on their own. Whether you’re flipping burgers at McDonalds or taking tickets at the movie theater, you are contributing to the fabric of society, and you should be able, at a basic level, to succeed off of that,” Level said.
