Living on the Line: A Story of Minimum Wage in KC

The following is a fictional scenario, but it’s based on real numbers and real challenges faced by thousands of people earning minimum wage in Kansas and Missouri.

Every morning, Jordan wakes up before the sun rises in her one-bedroom apartment in Kansas City, Missouri. She’s 27, works full-time at a local grocery store, and brings home Missouri’s minimum wage—$12.30 an hour. On paper, that’s about $1,968 a month. It sounds manageable, maybe even okay.

But by the time rent is due, things already feel tight. Her studio apartment costs $900, and that doesn’t include utilities. After adding $100 for electric and water, $75 for phone and internet, and $150 for the gas it takes to get to work, Jordan is already down to less than $750 for everything else.

Groceries? That’s another $250, and she’s buying the basics—canned goods, bulk pasta, frozen vegetables. There’s no room for surprise expenses. No savings. No margin. When her car broke down last winter, she had to borrow money just to fix it—and it took her three months to pay it back.

Now imagine the same story in Kansas. But instead of making $12.30 an hour, you’re making $7.25—the federal minimum wage Kansas still uses. That’s only $1,160 a month before taxes. For someone like Darnell, a 22-year-old line cook working full-time in Topeka, the math just doesn’t work. His rent is $800. After that, there’s barely enough left for food—forget about transportation, medicine, or anything unexpected.

And if you’re raising a child? Like Mary, a single mom of a 3-year-old living in Kansas City, Kansas, even Missouri’s higher minimum wage doesn’t go far enough. Childcare alone can be $700 a month. Groceries for two? At least $400. Add rent, utilities, and diapers, and Mary is $500 in the red every single month—even while working full-time. She relies on WIC, SNAP, and the kindness of her sister, who watches her son for free during her night shifts.

These aren’t real people, but they reflect the real math that plays out every day in homes across Kansas and Missouri. Living on minimum wage doesn’t just mean living paycheck to paycheck—it means living in constant calculation: Can I pay rent and buy groceries this week? If I fill a prescription, will I have enough gas to get to work? What happens if something goes wrong?

For too many workers, the answer is simple: you can’t afford for anything to go wrong. And yet, every day, people get up and go to work anyway—because they have to.

Because no one should work 40 hours a week and still be hungry.