Living Wages
Living wage policies have been established in cities, counties, school districts, states and other public agencies throughout the country to lift workers out of poverty. Most living wage laws set minimum wage and benefit standards for public contracts, subsidies and leaseholders on public land. Several are based upon a geographic zone. Today there are over 150 such laws in place.
Commentary
Cry Wolf Quotes
If the proposed ordinance is adopted it will hurt small women- and minority-owned businesses the most, the majority of which are already struggling mightily to do business in this city of higher-than-average costs of doing business.
This is bad news for cities. The living wage poses a big threat to their economic health, because the costs and restrictions it imposes on the private sector will destroy jobs —especially low-wage jobs — and send businesses fleeing to other locales.
Why, then, would [the Boston City Council] threaten to drive away businesses by signing on to a murky, unpredictable, and divisive ordinance that requires employers and their subcontractors to open their books, including wages, deductions, and fringe benefits, to all "applicable" city departments? The Internal Revenue Service and the state Department of Revenue are required to keep such information confidential. The city ordinance requires it to be made public, placing businesses at a competitive disadvantage.
By mandating an even higher minimum, the living wage prices even more people out of work. The people who push these cockamamie ideas never seem to ask why any employer would hire someone at $8.23 if that person's services are only valued in the marketplace at, say, $5.00.
Related Laws and Rules
Evidence
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The Economic Impact of Local Living Wages
The Economic Policy Institute finds that the costs of living wage ordinances are often overestimated.
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Examining the Evidence: The Impact of the Los Angeles Living Wage Ordinance on Workers and Employers
Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy: The LA living wage ordinance brought a pay raise to 10,000 workers, most of whom were poor.
Backgrounders & Briefs
Living Wage Policy Brief: Stephanie Luce
Living wage ordinances have helped thousands of workers and tiresome cry wolf claims are wrong.
Resources
Political Economy Research Institute is a think tank focused on a variety of subjects such as diverse financial regulation, living wages and environmental protection.
University of California-Berkeley Labor Center carries out research on labor and workplace-related issues.
The National Employment Law Project is an organization that promotes economically just public policy in the face of the prevailing trends of the law several decades.
