Employers were Allowed to Pay Employees 1.60$ an Hour

In 1938 The minimum wage was implemented in the USA at a whopping $0.25. '

That's so low!' I hear you saying, 'I'm so glad the minimum wage was raised!'

Hold up. That's not the whole story. Adjusted for inflation, that amount is equal to $5.09 in 2020. 

'But that's still lower than our current minimum wage.' hold your horses I'm getting there.  

In 1968 the minimum wage was $1.60, equal to $12.18 in today's economy. Essentially, workers in the 60s were being paid $4.93 more than workers in 2021. See the problem?

It seems like an obvious thing to fix, why are we still fighting about it? People against raising the minimum wage have a good reason for opposing it. Raising the minimum wage so drastically would put a lot of strain on businesses who suddenly have to figure out where that extra pay is coming from. Do they lay off workers? Do they raise prices? Will they go bankrupt!? These are, understandably, very hard decisions for business owners to make. 

But, does it really have to be a drastic change? What if we raised the minimum wage gradually over time? Did you know that lots of other countries are doing that exact thing?

In France, Australia, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, and Costa Rica, the minimum wage is reviewed and changed annually and their minimum wage rises gradually over time, putting very little strain on businesses.

Okay, so why aren't we doing that? The answer is simple, the US doesn't have any laws in place that mandate how and when we change our minimum wage. For the wage to be raised, it has to be approved by congress which happens every decade or so. By the time they do actually agree to raise it the gap is so significant that it causes mass panic. Individual states can raise the minimum wage higher if they want, Washington State decided to do just that, raising their minimum wage each year based on inflation.

In 2021 we're getting close to another big raise in the minimum wage. Politicians are debating about it and arguing about it and yelling at each other about it. I don't know about you, but I'm tired of the debating. Why are we, the people earning minimum wage, the parents whose children are living off minimum wage, letting politicians debate about whether we deserve to be paid a living salary? In America, we seem to think that we can't do much about it. Big Brother is leaning over us holding us down and keeping us quiet. That's not true. There's what? A few hundred of them? There are millions of us. "73.3 million workers age 16 and older in the United States were paid at hourly rates, representing 55.5 percent of all wage and salary workers"(BLS) They can't fight all of us. Start making some noise.

Sources:

Vox: What the US gets wrong about minimum wage

BLS Reports: Characteristics of minimum wage workers

Wikipedia (Suck it, Professors)