30 years ago a high school diploma could get you a job paying $8 an hour

[AllosaursRus]

I frankly don't see how that's possible, unless she is only a part-timer, or works in a menial job at an insurance company, or is employed in a one-doc clinic in North Elk-Rectum, Idaho, and has to take her wages largely in butchered game animals. 

Hey, hey, hey, what the hell is that Idaho crack? My Doc's nurse practioner makes around 50K! 

And you could pretty much call this place North Elk-Rectum too!

[DumbAss Tanker]

They don't even want to go there.  My base pay when I went to boot back in 1984 (where I came in as an E-3, not E-1) was a whopping $695 a month.

It really pays a whole lot better now, and especially with the educational benefits it is honestly a Hell of a first job.  I remember what it was like back in the day, though.  I recall around 1978 doing my taxes as a buck sergeant, and seeing my gross pay for the year was a whopping $7,500 -- no allowances, since as an E5 I had to live in the barracks and eat in the messhall, both of which were of abysmal quality and in any real free market would have had a negative value, contrary to the infuriatingly untruthful 'Statement of benefits' the military pay pukes would attach to the LES at tax time.   

[NHSparky]

Oh, I totally get that.  It's a wonder to me that the first McDonalds on a military base ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD didn't open until 1985 (Great Lakes, IL).  I was there for that.  I remember it quite well.  January 26th, 1985--a blizzard.  -30 degrees, 35 mph winds, -78 wind chills.  We were ORDERED to stay inside.  It didn't work.  Besides, the pipes had all frozen at the galley and turned the damned place into an ice rink.

But mind you, by the time I got out it was incredible how much one has to make just to bring home the same amount of money.

Maybe the knuckleheads on DU ought to be grateful they're not EXPECTED to do crappy jobs and work their way up.  Can't have that in our little Obummer elitist entitlement world, now can we?

[Lord Undies]

$8.00 in 1978 had about the same buying power as $27.02 in 2008.

Annual inflation over this period was about 4.14%

http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.htm

[NHSparky]

Which basically means my earnings have either kept pace with or exceeded inflation.  Amazing what a little hard work will do for ya.

And no, I don't think your basic HS grad today is worth $27 an hour.  Period.  Not fresh out of HS.

[Lord Undies]

Which basically means my earnings have either kept pace with or exceeded inflation.  Amazing what a little hard work will do for ya.

And no, I don't think your basic HS grad today is worth $27 an hour.  Period.  Not fresh out of HS.

Not many were worth $8.00 per hour in 1978.  I was 23 years old.  I quit managing a 7-11 to go to school.  I was bringing home $250.00 every two weeks.  That's $125.00 per week.  We were doing really good.

My wife was making about the same amount as a nurse.   We had our son and two baby daughters.  They were born 06-04-76 and 07-06-77.  People thought they were twins. 

$250.00 in 1978 had about the same buying power as $844.32 in 2008.

Annual inflation over this period was about 4.14%.

And that was the Carter years!

[DumbAss Tanker]

I started law school in Fall of '79.  The going rate for summer internships was about $5 an hour.  Typical attorney hourly billing was in the ballpark of $35 at the time.

[NHSparky]

I wish I had made more than $8/hr before I got off the boats.  Anyone on active duty I knew laughed when we were told to figure our salary based on a 40-45 hour workweek.

Don't get me wrong, I don't miss the Navy, but I miss the people.  I got a lot of opportunities that I never would have gotten from a book, and discovered a lot of the things I needed to be successful. 

Maybe if the DUmmies realized all life does not eminate from a classroom or how "smrat" they think they are/are told they are, they might move past themselves.

But somehow, I doubt it.