Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
General Discussion
Showing Original Post only (View all)THE PAY IS TOO DAMN LOW [View all]
BY JAMES SUROWIECKI
A few weeks ago, Washington, D.C., passed a living-wage bill designed to make Walmart pay its workers a minimum of $12.50 an hour. Then President Obama called on Congress to raise the federal minimum wage (which is currently $7.25 an hour). McDonalds was widely derided for releasing a budget to help its employees plan financially, since that only underscored how brutally hard it is to live on a McDonalds wage. And last week fast-food workers across the country staged walkouts, calling for an increase in their pay to fifteen dollars an hour. Low-wage earners have long been the hardest workers to organize and the easiest to ignore. Now theyre front-page news.
The workers grievances are simple: low wages, few (if any) benefits, and little full-time work. In inflation-adjusted terms, the minimum wage, though higher than it was a decade ago, is still well below its 1968 peak (when it was worth about $10.70 an hour in todays dollars), and its still poverty-level pay. To make matters worse, most fast-food and retail work is part time, and the weak job market has eroded what little bargaining power low-wage workers had: their earnings actually fell between 2009 and last year, according to the National Employment Law Project.
Still, the reason this has become a big political issue is not that the jobs have changed; its that the people doing the jobs have. Historically, low-wage work tended to be done either by the young or by women looking for part-time jobs to supplement family income. As the historian Bethany Moreton has shown, Walmart in its early days sought explicitly to hire underemployed married women. Fast-food workforces, meanwhile, were dominated by teen-agers. Now, though, plenty of family breadwinners are stuck in these jobs. Thats because, over the past three decades, the U.S. economy has done a poor job of creating good middle-class jobs; five of the six fastest-growing job categories today pay less than the median wage. Thats why, as a recent study by the economists John Schmitt and Janelle Jones has shown, low-wage workers are older and better educated than ever. More important, more of them are relying on their paychecks not for pin money or to pay for Friday-night dates but, rather, to support families. Forty years ago, there was no expectation that fast-food or discount-retail jobs would provide a living wage, because these were not jobs that, in the main, adult heads of household did. Today, low-wage workers provide forty-six per cent of their familys income. It is that change which is driving the demand for higher pay.
The situation is the result of a tectonic shift in the American economy. In 1960, the countrys biggest employer, General Motors, was also its most profitable company and one of its best-paying. It had high profit margins and real pricing power, even as it was paying its workers union wages. And it was not alone: firms like Ford, Standard Oil, and Bethlehem Steel employed huge numbers of well-paid workers while earning big profits. Today, the countrys biggest employers are retailers and fast-food chains, almost all of which have built their businesses on low paytheyve striven to keep wages down and unions outand low prices.
much more
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2013/08/12/130812ta_talk_surowiecki
InfoView thread info, including edit history
TrashPut this thread in your Trash Can (My DU » Trash Can)
BookmarkAdd this thread to your Bookmarks (My DU » Bookmarks)
94 replies, 16367 views
ShareGet links to this post and/or share on social media
AlertAlert this post for a rule violation
PowersThere are no powers you can use on this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
ReplyReply to this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
Rec (110)
ReplyReply to this post
94 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
![](du4img/smicon-reply-new.gif)
If You Don't Like The Pay On The Job You Have You Are Free To Go Get Another One
TheMastersNemesis
Aug 2013
#1
bullshit. a lot of folks dont' want hard physical labor that pays minimum wage -- but they are
HiPointDem
Aug 2013
#40
That "worker shortage in IT" bullshit is always preparatory to asking for more H1B visas.
LongTomH
Aug 2013
#54
Mine neither. I'm a small biz owner in IL and the LOWEST wage I START is $10/hr
riderinthestorm
Aug 2013
#58
Good thing he doesn't live on that. He's retired and only works for me @ 10 hours/wk
riderinthestorm
Aug 2013
#91
You know, you haven't addressed my real life, real time example in post #58
riderinthestorm
Aug 2013
#65
Washington State made a "dramatic and significant hike in the minimum wage" to $9.19 per hour.
lumberjack_jeff
Aug 2013
#85
+1000 At the Jobs for Justice Rally in KC last week, I heard from fast food workers, including....
LongTomH
Aug 2013
#52
Maybe it would help to stop signing let's-send-jobs-to-foreign-countries "free trade" agreements.
AnotherMcIntosh
Aug 2013
#26
You are in IT? When he seeks to hire a H-1B replacment, I hope that you have a contract with a
AnotherMcIntosh
Aug 2013
#35
Whatever you do, always work towards getting a written employment contract with a clause
AnotherMcIntosh
Aug 2013
#41
The profiteers won't be happy til working people once again live like this
HereSince1628
Aug 2013
#51
I know a guy who is a supervisor for an elevator company here in Vegas....
Spitfire of ATJ
Aug 2013
#56
Workers need to stop waiting around for politicians to flick a crumb off their table.
Skeeter Barnes
Aug 2013
#77