“In a tweet voicing his opposition to raising the national minimum wage to $15 an hour, Republican South Dakota Senator John Thune said he made $6 an hour working at a restaurant as a ‘kid.’ Adjusted for modern inflation, that would be $24 an hour today. Congressional Republicans have largely opposed the Democratic proposal to raise the minimum wage. They argue a wage hike will harm small businesses who have already been economically harmed during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. ‘I started working by bussing tables at the Star Family Restaurant for $1/hour and slowly moved up to cook – the big leagues for a kid like me – to earn $6/hour,’ Thune tweeted Wednesday evening. ‘Businesses in small towns survive on narrow margins. Mandating a $15 minimum wage would put many of them out of business.'”
“It’s unclear which years Thune worked at the restaurant in his hometown of Murdo, South Dakota, where he attended high school. However, Thune was born in 1961. Assuming he was earning $6 an hour by the time he was 17 – the last year one is still considered a non-adult under the national age of consent, which is 18 – the year would have been 1978. A $6 an hour wage in 1978, adjusted to modern inflation rates, would equal $24.07 an hour in 2021. A person making $24.07 an hour, working 40 hours a week would earn over $50,000 annually before taxes” – Newsweek.