Affordability in Hours: A Time-Indexed Minimum Wage and an Essential Hours Credit

Date: 2025-10-15 · Version: Preprint (v2) ·
DOI: 10.31235/osf.io/ztbx2_v2

Authors: Alec Pow¹; Lora Stonden² ·
Contributors: Alec Pow; Lora Stonden ·
Affiliations: ¹ ThePricer Media, LLC; ² Independent Researcher ·
Coverage: 2000–2025 (indices rebased to 2019=1)

Executive Summary (text version)

Monthly Survival Hours (MSH)—the paid work time required to cover a fixed essentials basket—rose sharply after 2019, then partially retraced:

  • D3 renters: 117.4 hours (2019) → 175.7 hours (2022) → 157.7 hours (2025).
  • Renter–Owner gap (“Renter’s Surcharge”): across six metros in 2025, renters face an additional ~3.8–8.7 hours/month relative to owners.

Policy tests. We evaluate a Time-Indexed Minimum Wage (TIMW) anchored to hours, plus an Essential Hours Tax Credit (EHTC) that backstops shortfalls:

  • TIMW target: Htarget = 120 hours/month, adjusted semi-annually with a ≤5% glide cap to limit shocks.
  • EHTC backstop: refunds shortfalls below Hthreshold = 100 hours/month (default α = 0.8):
    EHTCg,t = α · max(0, Hg,t − Hthreshold) × wg,t

Key takeaways

  1. Hours, not dollars, reveal stress: indexing to paid time normalizes across regions and wage levels.
  2. Post-pandemic spike persists: even with disinflation, typical renters still face elevated monthly hours vs. 2019.
  3. Renter penalty is material: housing tenure alone adds ~4–9 hours/month in several large metros.
  4. TIMW + EHTC is complementary: wage indexation reduces average hours; the credit caps tail risk for low-hour households.

Method in a paragraph

MSH converts a fixed essentials basket into hours using cohort wages (BLS CPS/OEWS) and item-level CPI (rebased to 2019=1), tracked by wage decile (D1–D10), tenure (renter vs. owner), and six metros. The TIMW targets Htarget=120 h/mo with ≤5% semiannual adjustments. The EHTC backstops shortfalls below 100 h/mo at share α of the gap, valued at cohort wage wg,t.

Data

  • BLS CPI (item indices)
  • BLS CPS / OEWS (wages by decile)
  • Authors’ calculations

Scope

  • 2000–2025; base year 2019=1
  • National + six metros
  • D1–D10 cohorts; renter vs. owner

Safeguards

  • ≤5% semiannual TIMW glide
  • EHTC caps extreme shortfalls
  • Monitoring: hours, not just CPI
Cite as
Pow, A., & Stonden, L. (2025). Affordability in Hours: A Time-Indexed Minimum Wage and an Essential Hours Credit. Preprint (v2). https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/ztbx2_v2
Data & code: GitHub repo
License: CC BY 4.0 (paper/figures); MIT (code)