You are correct. True buying power has gone down. The reason is that we no longer get the benefit of virtual slavery to produce our products and give us our services. Of course, if those who live off the minimum wage had a little more to live on they might then be more mobile and the minimum wage in a locality would be truly competitive and fair. Oh yes, you'd also have to have a vesting that you could transfer from one employer to another.
I guess Boeing had an old and mediocre president at that time. Hey, I was at Boeing when they were vying for that contract. If memory serves me, I was up at Everett at that time. However, I started at the facility across from the old Boeing Field (King County Airport). I saw AWACS before it was finalized and large drones which confused me a great deal. They also had the concrete cover to the Peacekeeper, aka MX, missile silo. I started out working on that silo. Yep, I'm the manufacturing engineer who built the box that shoots that missile. Ha, I am famous. Let me go on, my right hand shook the right hands of both Nixon and Kennedy (JFK). I also had a conversation, albeit brief, with Nelson Rockefeller. Well, there it is. Wish I had more to brag about. Oh, I do have a cool flag pole with light and all weather flag right across the football field from Lakeridge High School.