About those underemployed millennials -

[hfojvt]

5. here's the inflation calculator

so nobody has to guess that they have not kept up with inflation

http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl

In 1996 I was making $7.15 an hour as a no benefits part-time janitor.

That's only $10.64 in today's money.

In 2002, I started a part-time janitor job that paid benefits, making $10.69 an hour. That's only $13.88 an hour in today's money. Even taking away the 7.5% raise I got for becoming supervisor I would make over $14 an hour for the same job.

So I have kept up with inflation. Surprising, since there have not been raises in years with budgets being tight.

Unless you go back to 1986 when I was a GS-7 making $8.54 an hour, which would be $18.20 in today's money. I see that a GS-7 today only makes $16.28 an hour, about 90% of what they did in 1986.

Still, if I had started as a GS-7 those 11 years ago, I would now be at least Step 6, making $19 an hour. So there are other ways to keep up with, or exceed inflation, and from where I sit, GS-7s still make decent money.