In my opinion, the state median hourly wages would provide a more realistic picture due to the fact that, for example, many (16) states follow the federal minimum wage requirement of $7.25, but only 1.25% of the US population actually makes the federal minimum, hence the data can become significantly skewed towards the minority of the population within those states rather than the average or majority of college students the data is depicting.
To make a quick illustration of my point, take Wyoming, for instance:
Wyoming's state minimum wage is $7.25, however, the median annual income for a Wyomingyte is $33,031, or $14.7 an hour. Using your own methodology then this would result in a halving of the number of hours needed for the average college student to pay for their college tuition and fees unless all of Wyoming's college students someone ended up falling inside the percentage (1.9%, according to Statista) of workers within the state that's meeting the state's minimum, which seems unlikely.
Please don't take this as some sort of comment on the cost or work required to pay for tuition nowadays; I'm in agreement with everyone else that It's way too expensive. I just feel that the output from the data used is not truly representative of the "average."
Definitely__Happened t1_j4srdai wrote
Reply to The Number of Hours You'd Have to Work at a Minimum Wage Job to Afford a Year of Tuition in Each State by SandyBeaches2016
In my opinion, the state median hourly wages would provide a more realistic picture due to the fact that, for example, many (16) states follow the federal minimum wage requirement of $7.25, but only 1.25% of the US population actually makes the federal minimum, hence the data can become significantly skewed towards the minority of the population within those states rather than the average or majority of college students the data is depicting.
To make a quick illustration of my point, take Wyoming, for instance:
Wyoming's state minimum wage is $7.25, however, the median annual income for a Wyomingyte is $33,031, or $14.7 an hour. Using your own methodology then this would result in a halving of the number of hours needed for the average college student to pay for their college tuition and fees unless all of Wyoming's college students someone ended up falling inside the percentage (1.9%, according to Statista) of workers within the state that's meeting the state's minimum, which seems unlikely.
Please don't take this as some sort of comment on the cost or work required to pay for tuition nowadays; I'm in agreement with everyone else that It's way too expensive. I just feel that the output from the data used is not truly representative of the "average."