It's really about translation of pricing.
Say you have someone making minimum wage of $7.85 in 2018 - At $2.63/gallon, and their pickup truck has a 25 gallon tank, that is about 8.4 hours.
Now, here in our current workers paradise, Let's get someone making $11.15/hour today. They're driving the truck they got from their big brother. It is $4.89/gallon here. Works out to about 11 hours for the tank of gas to enable them to get to work.
But hey, they should just go out and buy a $40,000 electric car.