The beautiful, energetic high school students of today will, sooner or later, be workers. They will gain one kind of freedom at the expense of another.<\/p>\n
Even at age 18, I never paid attention to prices. \u00a0By age 22, I did. \u00a0A university student sharing a 1BR apartment, I was very poor. \u00a0I finished my degree at age 25, always working a minimum wage job on the side. \u00a0Being young was fun in ways, but making a living was sobering.<\/p>\n
Statistics Canada has a measure called the Consumer Price Index<\/a> or CPI . \u00a0For many, its immediate use is tracking the cost of living.<\/p>\n The scale works as follows: \u00a0the base cost of 100 represents the year 2002. \u00a0Each year (or month) thence is given a number that compares its cost of living to that of 2002. \u00a0For BC, the November 2014 CPI was 118.8 (statcan.gc.ca)<\/a>, meaning the cost of living had increased by 18.8% since 2002.<\/p>\n Of course, the cost of living is only half the story. \u00a0To begin to know how much harder, or easier, it is to make a living, we need to compare the increase in cost of living with the increase in wages.<\/p>\n Among the people most affected by changing prices are those earning minimum wage. In 2002, the BC minimum wage was $8\/hr (hrvoice.org<\/a>); now, it’s $10.25 (globalnews.ca)<\/a>. \u00a0The percent increase is (10.25-8)\/8 = 0.28 or 28%.<\/p>\n Although living’s not easy on minumum wage, it seems the wage itself has gone up by 28% since 2002, while the cost of living has increased by 18.8% over that period. That’s for BC.<\/p>\n There is endless material for discussion in the world of home economics. Look for more posts about it coming soon:)<\/p>\n
![hrvoice.org<\/a>); now, it’s $10.25](\"http:\/\/www.hrvoice.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/BCBC-Minimum-Wage-Figure-3-300x270.jpg\"){kind=link}