A 'living wage' with money to pay for child care needs to be over $35/hour. NOBODY can pay that for an entry-level job. That has been the main problem since schools were shutting down or going remote all the time.
Even if my teenage cousins were paid $20/hour - they would NOT work with masks. "living wage" has nothing to do with it - the working environment for most everyone did. Nobody is forced to work just because pay is higher. I've got a few friends who have quit work and are making $1,000+ a week on TikTok/
YouTube. Wonder how many of those out-of-the-mainstream-workforce people there are.