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This is Labor Day weekend and for reasons that will be clear at the end I’ve been thinking about the minimum wage. Also, the overwhelming majority of low income and middle class people in America today work, some more than one job, struggling just to make ends meet. Labor is what they do all the time.

The minimum wage goes back to the Fair Labor Standards Act of the 1930’s. In 1938 the federal minimum wage was set at 25 cents an hour. Today it is $7.25 an hour. That is not what you would call a giant increase given the rate of inflation for that same period of time. In some states the minimum wage is higher than federal guidelines. Labor unions want both federal and state minimum wage standards raised. Opponents say that will hurt jobs. Let’s see what this argument actually means in dollars.

At $7.25 an hour a person who works 40 hours a week will make $290 before taxes. If they work 50 hours they will take home $362.50 for the week. In a typical month the take home pay for a 40 hour a week job is $1160; for 50 hours it is $1450. Let’s double the hours for both. Working 80 hours a week will mean bringing home $2320 a month, and 100 hours a week will mean having a paycheck of $2900 for the month. Not much to live on, if you ask me. Besides, who works a 100 hours every week?

Of course, most people earn more than the minimum wage. The median household income depends on where you live. In Kentucky, for example, it is a little over $42,000. In Arkansas close to $40,000; Texas $49,000; North Carolina is around $45,000; and in my state of Minnesota $57,000. Overall Maryland and Alaska have the highest household incomes at $67,000. The lowest is Mississippi at $39,000. Because we are talking about median level incomes, half the people of each state make less than the amount cited and half make more.

What is interesting when you look at the figures is that the governors of the states with the lowest median income also have the most people without health insurance. Yet most of them oppose Obamacare. So not only are incomes for large portions of the people in their states very low, when they get sick they have to go to the hospital emergency room for treatment. That adds greatly to hospital costs and also premium rates for people who have insurance. If the people without insurance and financial resources do go to the hospital, they often don’t buy medications prescribed to help them because they cannot afford to. If they don’t go and happen to be seriously ill, they likely become one of the 45,000 people who die every year here in the U.S. because they don’ t have access to medical care.

In this context I find opposition to raising the minimum wage a curious thing, also given the fact that it would affect only the poorest of the poor and that wealth has grown in this country to the point where more than 20% of American households earn at least $100,000 a year. Of course, as I read somewhere, that may sound like a lot of money, but one should bear in mind that a $100,000 doesn’t buy what it used to. That’s true, of course, but you know what, neither does $15,000, $30,000, or $40,000. The basic question is how that decline in purchasing power affects families. For some people the decline cuts into their discretionary spending. For others it cuts into what they need to live on. That is more than a small difference.

It seems to me the question is not should the minimum wage be raised, but what kind of country we want to be. We can say that paying someone $9 an hour will hurt the economy, but in truth not doing so will hurt our economy and our country far more, and will make all of us poorer in the process. But for the sake of full disclosure, I am proud to say I think the way I do in large part because of my father. He spent his life working very long hours to ensure that his union members would receive a fair wage. He would have worked even longer had bad health not forced him into retirement and led to his premature death when he was only 63.

So to him I offer this salute from me and my brother who shares my views: “Happy Labor Day, Pop. We still miss you, and will always remember what you stood for. Proud to be your sons.”