Just went down a rabbit hole looking at minimum wage history and it's kind of wild. So the federal minimum is still $7.25 - hasn't budged since 2009. But here's the thing that got me: when you adjust for inflation, that $7.25 today is basically worth what minimum wage was back in the early 2000s. Like in 2000, minimum wage was $5.15, which sounds lower until you realize that's about $8.61 in 2023 dollars. So we've gone backwards in real purchasing power over two decades.

Back in the 50s and 60s, minimum wage actually felt more meaningful relative to cost of living. A dollar in 1956 was worth like $10.59 in 2023 money. Even in 1968 it hit $1.60, which translates to over $13 in modern dollars. Meanwhile we've been stuck at $7.25 for 15+ years while everything else got more expensive.

There was that push in 2019 to raise it to $15 by 2025, which would've helped millions of workers, but obviously that didn't happen at the federal level. Some states moved on their own, but the math just doesn't work anymore. Minimum wage in 2000 was what was minimum wage in 2000, but the gap between then and now shows how much inflation has eaten into worker earnings.