“It’s not about how much you make—it’s about how much you save and invest.” This bit of homespun financial wisdom is repeated by everyone from self-help authors to cable news pundits. But for millions of minimum wage workers in America, it’s not just misleading—it’s a cruel distortion of reality.
Behind this mantra lies an assumption that anyone, regardless of income, has the discretionary income necessary to build wealth. Yet, a closer look at the data over the last 50 years reveals how the economic ground has shifted beneath the feet of low-wage workers. The problem isn’t that they don’t save or invest. It’s that they can’t.
Gold, Stocks, and the Vanishing Dream
To understand how dramatically things have changed, consider two common benchmarks of personal wealth-building: gold and stock in The Coca-Cola Company.
In 1975, the federal minimum wage was $2.10 per hour. An ounce of gold cost about $162. A worker earning minimum wage needed roughly 77 hours of labor to afford it. In 2025, the price of gold has risen to over $3,380, while the federal minimum wage has remained frozen at $7.25. It now takes over 466 hours to afford the same ounce. That’s nearly six times more work for the same asset.
The same pattern holds true for investing in equities. In 1975, a share of Coca-Cola stock cost just over $4—less than two hours of minimum-wage labor. By 2009, it required about two and a half hours. Today, that same share costs nearly $69, or 9.5 hours of minimum-wage labor. The idea that a minimum wage worker could regularly invest in stable, dividend-paying stocks is now borderline absurd.
Average Wages Rise—Minimum Wages Do Not
It’s not that wages haven’t risen overall. The average hourly wage in 1975 was $5.36—about 2.5 times the minimum wage. By 2009, it was $19.34, or 2.7 times the minimum. In 2025, it’s around $37.44, meaning the average worker now earns more than five times what a minimum wage worker does.
This is not merely a gap. It is a chasm.
While middle- and upper-income workers have seen their earnings increase in ways that allow them to build wealth, minimum wage workers have seen their economic mobility collapse. The wealth ladder hasn’t just been pulled up—it’s been dismantled.
The Myth of Equal Opportunity
For decades, we’ve clung to the belief that America is a land of opportunity. But opportunity requires access. It requires having something left at the end of the week to save, to invest, to build a future.
In 1975, even low-wage workers had a path—narrow though it may have been—to participate in the economy beyond mere survival. Today, that path is closed off. The minimum wage no longer buys meaningful time, let alone a stake in the future.
So when a financial “expert” tells a roomful of struggling workers that their problem is spending too much on lattes or not budgeting properly, they’re not just being out of touch. They’re perpetuating a lie that hides the systemic failure of our wage policy.
It Is About How Much You Make
Saving and investing are only possible if you earn enough to cover the basics. And in 2025, the minimum wage doesn’t even cover the cost of catching up.
For millions, the issue isn’t poor financial habits—it’s a labor market and wage system that denies them the ability to begin building wealth. No amount of grit or smart investing advice can change that.
If we’re going to have an honest conversation about personal finance in America, it’s time to start with this simple truth:
It absolutely is about how much you make.
Timothy Alexander is the founder of MyChesCo, an independent online news platform serving Chester County, Pennsylvania. A seasoned journalist and editorial voice, he writes on the intersection of technology, economics, and policy with a focus on community impact and government accountability.
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