Low-wage workers' paychecks make up over half of their family's total earnings

The bars show how much low-wage workers, on average, contribute to their family's total earnings. For example, low-wage workers' earnings make up 57.2% of the family's total earnings on average.

The bar chart shows the average share of earnings workers contributed to their family's total income comparing low-wage workers to all workers. On average, low-wage workers' earnings made up 57.2% of their family's total earnings and all workers contributed 66.4% to their family's total earnings.
In 2022, the value of the low-wage threshold is $19.69. The sample includes workers who live in California, were employed last week but not self-employed, ages 16+, and with non-zero earnings last week.
Chart: UC Berkeley Labor CenterSource: IPUMS Current Population Survey - Annual Social and Economic Supplement 2022 • Get the dataEmbed Download imageDownload PDFDownload SVGCreated with Datawrapper