Wages

Bold Increases In The Minimum Wage Should Be Evaluated For The Benefits Of Raising Low-Wage Workers’ Total Earnings

April 23, 2018 By David Cooper, Lawrence Mishel, and Ben Zipperer, Epi.org Educate! Minimum Wage, New Economy, Wages

Workers today paid the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour are making 25 percent less than their counterparts made in 1968, despite the fact that the nation’s productivity has roughly doubled since then. Concern that low-wage workers are being deprived of the wage increases their increased productivity should deliver has led local, state, and federal policymakers to propose minimum wage increases that exceed the minimum wage increases that took effect in the 1990s and 2000s. Among the bolder proposals is a 2017 bill introduced by Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.) to increase the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2024, which would raise the minimum wage above its inflation-adjusted peak value in 1968. California, Washington, D.C.,...

Massive Minimum Wage Study Finds Significant Gains For Low-Income Workers And Few Downsides

April 9, 2018 By Cody Fenwick, AlterNet.org Create! Minimum Wage, New Economy, Research, Wages

The study is indeed impressive. Census researchers Kevin Rinz and John Voorheis used data from the bureau's Annual Social and Economic Supplement, which surveys more than 75,000 households. The authors then link this data with administrative filings from the Social Security Administration on wages and track the changes between 1991 and 2013. The study stands out for covering such a large number of people over such an extended period. "[R]aising the minimum wage increases earnings growth at the bottom of the distribution, and those effects persist and indeed grow in magnitude over several years," the authors write. At the same time, there's little indication that other people will lose their jobs as a result of the minimum wage—the outcome conservatives always warn about.

No CEO Should Earn 1,000 Times More Than A Regular Employee

March 20, 2018 Sarah Anderson and Sam Pizzigati, Theguardian.com Educate! Class Struggle, Income inequality, Inequality, New Economy, Wages

The CEO of Marathon Petroleum, Gary Heminger, took home an astonishing 935 times more pay than his typical employee in 2017. In other words, one of Marathon’s gas station workers would have to toil more than nine centuries to make as much as Heminger grabbed in just one year. Employees of at least five other US firms would have to work even longer – more than a millennium – to catch up with their top bosses. These companies include the auto parts maker Aptiv (CEO-worker pay ratio: 2,526 to 1), the temp agency Manpower (2,483 to 1), amusement park owner Six Flags (1,920 to 1), Del Monte Produce (1,465 to 1), and apparel maker VF (1,353 to 1). These revelations come thanks to a new federal regulation that requires publicly traded US corporations to disclose, for the first time ever, how much their chief executives are making compared with their median workers.

Canadian Doctors Protest Pay Raises

March 11, 2018 Ryan Sit, Newsweek. Resist! Canada, Health Care, Wages

Hundreds of Canadian doctors, medical specialists and residents, as well as medical students, have signed a petition protesting their own pay raises, instead asking that the money be reallocated to help nurses and patients in need. “We, Quebec doctors who believe in a strong public system, oppose the recent salary increases negotiated by our medical federations,” reads the letter, originally posted in French, the official language in the Canadian province.

Univ. Of Illinois Graduate Student Workers Strike, Occupy President’s Office

March 7, 2018 Dawn Rhodes, Chicago Tribune. Resist! Education, Strike, Wages, Worker Rights and Jobs

In a sign of escalating tensions surrounding the strike at the University of Illinois, members of the graduate student workers union in Urbana-Champaign have camped outside the university president’s office and are refusing to leave until they receive a contract to their liking. Members of the Graduate Employees’ Organization walked off the job on Feb. 26 following nearly a year of unsuccessful contract talks with the administration.

Disney Unions’ Ballot Drive Seeks To Raise Wages Up To $18 An Hour For Hospitality Companies That Take Anaheim Subsidies

March 7, 2018 By Margot Roosevelt, Ocregister.com Resist! California, Labor, Unions, Wages

The Disneyland Resort and any large hospitality business benefiting from Anaheim city subsidies would be required to pay at least $15 an hour to their workers beginning in 2019 under a proposed ballot initiative sponsored by a coalition of unions. The city ballot initiative — announced to a boisterous, standing-room-only crowd of Disney’s largest unions Wednesday, Feb. 28 at the Anaheim Sheraton Park Hotel — would then raise the minimum wage at the affected companies in $1 increments annually until it reaches $18 an hour by Jan. 1, 2022. Beginning in 2023, the pay floor for those companies would be adjusted annually by at least 2 percent to reflect cost-of-living increases. “We are not attacking Disney,” said Christopher Duarte, president and chief executive of Workers United Local 50, the resort’s largest union with 6,700 members.

Day Of Typical CEO Pays More Than Year For Typical Worker

January 16, 2018 By Leo Gerard, Alternet.org Educate! CEO, New Economy, Wages, Workers Rights and Jobs

Fat Tuesday is Mardi Gras, a day of revelry, gluttony, intoxication and showers of shiny plastic beads. It is the party to end all parties because it’s followed by Ash Wednesday, when Lenten sacrifices commence. Fat Cat Tuesday is the day – Jan. 2, 2018 – on which the boards of directors of America’s biggest corporations handed their CEOs more money than those same CEOs would deign to pay their workers for an entire year of labor, 260 days. It was a day of revelry, gluttony and private jets for CEOs and worthless shiny plastic beads for workers. The occasion is commemorated in Britain as well. There, though, it took CEOs three days to accrue more compensation than the total annual wages of the typical worker. That’s because American CEO pay takes the cake – and we’re not talking Mardi Gras King Cake containing a tiny plastic baby Jesus figure because no Son of God would be associated with U.S. CEOs’ sinfully gluttonous pay packages.

Amazon Makes List Of Large Companies With Workers On Food Stamps

January 7, 2018 Mark Williams, Columbus Dispatch Educate! Amazon, Poverty, Wages, Worker Rights and Jobs

In short order, Amazon has become one of Ohio’s largest employers, after receiving tens of millions of dollars of state tax incentives for building warehouses, data centers and other projects along the way. Now, the online giant has quickly made its way onto another list, one charting the state’s employers with the most workers and their family members who also qualify for food stamps. Amazon ranks 19th on the list of 50 large employers, according to Policy Matters Ohio, a progressive policy group. Amazon had 1,430 workers and family members receiving benefits as of August, the group said Friday. A typical food-stamp beneficiary receives benefits for about two people, meaning Amazon likely has about 700 workers receiving food stamps, more than 10 percent of its Ohio workforce.

$2 Billion In Stolen Wages Recovered For Workers In 2015 & 2016

December 19, 2017 By Celine McNicholas, Zane Mokhiber, and Adam Chaikof Educate! Class Struggle, New Economy, Wages, Workers Rights and Jobs

What this study finds: In 2015 and 2016, a total of $2 billion in stolen wages ($880.3 million in 2015; $1.1 billion in 2016) were recovered for workers by the U.S. Department of Labor ($246.8 million in 2015; $266.6 million in 2016); by state departments of labor and attorneys general in 39 states ($170.0 million in 2015; $147.5 million in 2016); and through class action settlements ($463.6 million in 2015; $695.5 million in 2016). These represent wages stolen by employers who, for example, refuse to pay promised wages, pay employees for only some of the hours worked, or fail to pay overtime premiums when employees work more than 40 hours in a week.

The American Savings Crisis, Explained

December 17, 2017 Jeff Spross Educate! Cost of living, Finance and the Economy, New Economy, Wages

Americans are terrible at saving money. Since the 1970s, our personal savings rate has fallen from 12 percent to just 3 percent today. Almost half of all households don't have enough money socked away to meet a $400 emergency. At least one-third of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. It's easy to blame this on failings of individual discipline, and plenty of people do. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) recently griped about Americans who "are just spending every darn penny they have, whether it's on booze or women or movies." And there's a whole cottage industry of personal finance scolds insisting that everyone could save massive amounts if they just had the willpower.

Cutting Corporate Taxes Will Not Boost American Wages

October 30, 2017 Josh Bivens, www.epi.org Educate! Corporate tax, Corporations, New Economy, Taxes, Wages

By Josh Bivens for EPI - Bivens and Blair (2017) explain in detail how the theory for corporate tax cuts as a wage-boosting tool breaks down in the face of real-world data. This report provides a quick overview of this theory and then highlights how its predictions compare with real-world data. The theory is the following: First, corporate income tax cuts boost post-tax profits, which then boost the returns to owning stocks or bonds. These higher returns induce households to spend less and save more, and this increased supply of savings pushes down the cost of borrowing, or interest rates. Lower interest rates then induce firms to borrow more to finance new plants and equipment, and this raises productivity by giving workers more and better tools to work with. Second, competitive labor markets force employers to reward workers for their productivity increases buy paying them higher wages. This theory provides a number of empirical propositions regarding the effect of corporate tax changes on wage growth that can be tested with real-world data. The data show that many of the key predictions will almost surely fail. Before looking at the specific weak links in the causal chain, we review evidence relating to the overall claim that lower tax rates will boost productivity growth and wage growth.

US Wages Cyberwar Abroad Under Cover Of “Activism”

August 31, 2017 Joseph Thomas, www.journal-neo.org Educate! Cyber Warfare, Terrorism, Wages

By Joseph Thomas for NEO - The threat of cyberterrorism has competed for centre stage in American politics with fears of “Russian hackers” disrupting everything from elections to electrical grids. And yet as US policymakers wield threats of cyberterrorism to promote a long and growing list of countermeasures and pretexts for expanding its conflict with Moscow, it is simultaneously promoting very real cyberterrorism globally. Worst of all, it does so under the guise of “activism.” The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace recently published a paper titled, “Growing Cyber Activism in Thailand.” In it, readers may have expected a detailed description of how independent local activists were using information technology to inform the public, communicate with policymakers and organise themselves more efficiently. Instead, readers would find a list of US-funded fronts posing as “nongovernmental organisations” (NGOs) engaged in subversion, including attacks carried out against Thai government websites aimed at crippling them, the dumping of private information of ordinary citizens online and coercing policymakers into adopting their foreign-funded and directed agenda.

How Much Should Nonprofit Hospital CEOs Earn?

August 27, 2017 Alicia Freese, www.sevendaysvt.com Educate! CEO, Health Care, Income inequality, Wages

By Alicia Freeze for Seven Days. The average Vermonter makes about $50,000 a year. Executive directors of Vermont nonprofits make an average of $83,000, according to the group Common Good Vermont. Yet the heads of nonprofit hospitals in Vermont earn around $550,000 on average. Last year, the University of Vermont Medical Center CEO made more than $2 million. Hospital board members say their executive pay is in line with competitors and makes up a small portion of their budget. But not everyone buys that defense. "The public is struggling to pay for health care," said Sen. Chris Pearson (P/D-Chittenden). "To see that the CEO of our hospital is getting $2 million ... it's just way out of whack with the Vermont economy."

Living Paycheck To Paycheck Is A Way Of Life For Majority Of U.S. Workers

August 26, 2017 Staff, www.press.careerbuilder.com Educate! New Economy, Wages, Workers, Workers Rights and Jobs

By Staff of Career Builder - Having a higher salary doesn't necessarily mean money woes are behind you, with nearly one in 10 workers making $100,000 or more (9 percent) saying they usually or always live paycheck-to-paycheck and 59 percent in that income bracket in debt. Twenty-eight percent of workers making $50,000-$99,999 usually or always live paycheck to paycheck, 70 percent are in debt; and 51 percent of those making less than $50,000 usually or always live paycheck to paycheck to make ends meet, 73 percent are in debt. "As an employer, your employees' financial problems become your financial problems," said Rosemary Haefner, chief human resources officer for CareerBuilder. "If workers are constantly thinking about their financial struggles, their quality of work can decrease, and it can take a hit on their morale and productivity. If you do what you can to help people keep their finances under control — by doing things such as matching 401(k) contributions or hosting financial planning seminars — you'll ease some of their financial worries and it will be less likely to have a negative impact on your business."

Inside America’s Largest Worker-Run Business

August 19, 2017 Jay Cassano, www.fastcompany.com Create! Inequality, New Economy, Wages, Workers

By Jay Cassano for Fast Company - Fifteen years ago, Clara Calvo had just left her husband and her job. Both were abusive in their own ways. Her husband beat her, while her job at a beauty salon required long, unpredictable hours for little pay. Before that, she worked in a clothing factory in midtown Manhattan, earning a pittance for each hat she sewed, having immigrated from the Dominican Republic in 1995. Today, Calvo is able to support her three children as a single mother and sits on the board of company with over 2,000 employees that does $60 million in business per year. Solving Inequality: This is part of Co.Exist’s collection of stories about rising income inequality and big and bold ideas for how society can reverse this trend. See the whole list here. But Calvo also works as home health care worker, making just $10 an hour. Her company, Cooperative Home Care Associates (CHCA), is not like most other companies. It is a worker cooperative, an ownership structure that is somewhat rare in the U.S. but much more common in Spain, Italy, and parts of Latin America. In a worker cooperative, every worker can own an equal share of the company (and its profits) and get a say in company decisions.

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