Raising America's low wages
What started in the early 1990s with a few scattered campaigns to win better pay for low-wage workers has become a movement. Leah Samuel 919099 'The living wage movement is part of a general increase in energy for labor and community organizers, said Robert Pollin, co-author of The Living Wage. "I think it's really caught on in a lot of places, because we have so few proactive efforts these days, especially around economic justice, Azcarate, national director of Jobs with
There is still no campaign for a national living wage. But local struggles are linked and supported by national organizations like Jobs with and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).
This has opened the door for the passage of living wage laws in 30 cities, including Detroit, Baltimore, Chicago, Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Boston. Campaigns are currently under way in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Albuquerque, Philadelphia, and Dallas.
All the noise is slowly but surely moving the living wage issue into the national consciousness.
Proponents generally define a "living wage" as the amount necessary to keep a family of three or four above 28 International Viewpoint #315 October 1999 the poverty line. Most "living wage" legislation so far cover workers for companies which hold municipal contracts or which receive some sort of public funding. Homeless workers
In fact, "living wage" campaigns do much more than raise the wages of some low-income workers. Requiring companies holding city or county contracts to pay higher wages could reduce the financial incentive to privatize municipals services. Companies that recieve corporate tax-breaks could be forced to give something back to local communities by providing jobs that residents could
Most of the first campaigns were organised by community organizations such as housing groups, anti-poverty advocates and church charities-those who saw first-hand the effects of
"The living-wage campaign in Baltimore got started because people. with jobs were coming into the soup kitchens and homeless shelters," said Pollin. Baltimore was among the first cities to undertake a living-wage campaign.
San Francisco is one of the most recent. Ken Jacobs, campaign director of that city's Living Wage Coalition, said that rising poverty spurred the fight there. "The cost of living, especially rents, is skyrocketing," he rent minimum wage is 25% below what's needed to put a family at the poverty line—which is itself a poor measurement of poverty," he said. "But the general reality is that poor working people can't make a living, and you don't need statistics to show you that."
In addition, tying livable wages to the idea of getting something back from corporate privatization garnered more public support. The privatization issue had the added benefit of attracting support from public-sector trade unions. Getting labor involved
In some areas organized labor enthusiastically supported living wage campaigns; in others, the unions all but ignored them.
Sometimes union leaders felt that grassroots groups were intruding on their turf. Meanwhile, the working poor-those who would benefit from these campaigns-felt largely ignored by labor. They felt more connected to the community organizers and socialservice providers in their neighbor-
Unions became more active after the living wage movement had built up substantial momentum nationally. They brought much greater activist and funding resources.
The work of Jobs with Justice and ACORN in many cities offers examples of unions and community groups joining forces. Jobs with Justice specifically works to link unions with community and religious groups. "We think the labor movement understands, or should understand, that even if this doesn't directly impact their members, it's still important," said Fred Azcarate, national director of Jobs with Justice.
Winning is getting easier
Early on, the victories were few and hard-won. The opposition had wellfunded campaigns sponsored by the business community. Local chambers of commerce and conservative groups portrayed themselves as defenders of low-income workers, charging that higher wages would force employers to hire fewer workers, or move elsewhere.
Of course, the corporate community has overused this type of reasoning for years. "That argument applies to all minimum wage laws--if you raise the price of low-wage labor, businesses will demand less labor," said Pollin. "The evidence does not support that."
Nevertheless, those arguments often worked, especially in cities with high unemployment. "Whether we win or lose is a question of how much groundwork we are able to do before," " explain Azcarate. "Sometimes, business outspends us and out-organizes us."
In a few cases, even unions believed the hype, and turned their members against living wage proposals. In 1995, Minneapolis and St. Paul trade unions either refused endorsement or openly denounced the campaign.
The good news is that winning are getting easier. The movement has been strengthened by new research showing that a living wage does not erode jobs. Studies show that national increases in the minimum wage have always been followed by employment increases, not reductions.
And forcing government contractors to pay workers more increases the amount that local governments must pay the companies for contracted work.
According to Pollin, local living wage laws add little to business costs, and virtually nothing to government costs. "For one thing, government contractors are part of a competitivebidding process," says Pollin. "The living wage is, on average, one percent of total spending by businesses. If a business wants a city contract, they will absorb these costs, or the city will find someone cheaper."
The cost of the living wage is not enough to make businesses leave communities, either, Pollin says. "The types of firms that might leave are ones who have a high enough proportion of low-wage workers to make it costeffective enough to leave. The number of firms like that is relatively few." Good timing in Chicago
With information available to counter the naysayers, Minneapolis and St. Paul activists launched a new campaign soon after their 1995 defeat. They garnered labor support, assembling a task force that lobbied city councils of St. Paul and Minneapolis, eventually passing living wage resolutions in both cities.
As their experience grows, living wage organizers are becoming more savvy and creative. They are learning to strategize, and to connect other issues to the campaigns.
For example, San Francisco's living wage proposal would cover workfare workers as well. Since these workers have to "earn" their benefit by working, raising their "wages" means that they for less time. Then workfare workers could improve their education or hunt for real jobs.
In July, organizers in Chicago presented a living wage proposal to City Council members just before the politicians were going to vote themselves a salary increase. The resulting victory then spread to outlying Cook County, whose Board of Supervisors approved a living wage policy two months later.
But as more of these laws pass, organizers are finding that their work is just beginning.
"A lot of the real fight goes on after the proposal is approved, when the lawyers get ahold of it," Pollin said "The organizers really have to be committed to seeing the thing through." Quiet campaign
In some places, the new laws have become mired in struggles over implementation and interpretation. In cases where their campaigns petered out after the election, organizers have not been able to do much about it.
The campaign in Detroit last year was quiet. There were no rallies or other forms of high-visibility community mobilization. There was just the petitioning, led by ACORN, to get the measure on the ballot. The local AFL-CIO announced its support after ballot status was assured.
Opposition by the mayor and local businesses was too little and too late. Over 80% of Detroit voters approved an ordinance requiring companies getting city money to pay at least $7.50 an hour.
The organizers won, not by mobilizing community and labor support, but by slipping quietly under Detroit's corporate and political radar.
Afterwards, however, union and community organizers remained mostly silent as the city issued an interpretation severely limiting the number of workers covered. An AFL-CIO spokesperson said only, "We're having our lawyer look at it."
Meanwhile, the Chamber of Commerce is putting together an increasingly strong campaign to get the state legislature to quash the living wage law, claiming that voters did not understand what they were approving.
Pollin says it is time to raise the level of demands. So far, living wage laws directly benefit only the workers at a handful of small government contractors. "One reason they are winning is that they are narrow," he said, "but they should work to broaden the program and cover more workers." * A slightly longer version of this article first appeared in Labor Notes (USA) in July 1999
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Zimbabwe
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The MDC manifesto commits the party to social democracy, but does not have a clear program of land redistrbution, job creation, free education or primary health care. Nor does it reject privatisation or further implementation of the IMF-imposed free market and austerity policies begun in 1991 with the Economic Structural Adjustment Program (later incarnated as ZIMPREST). While noting that over one third of Zimbabwe revenues are used to pay interest on the international debt, the manifesto does not demand its cancellation. Alliances
The MDC is committed to a quota of 30% of all elected positions being held by women, and unofficially bas strong support from the 60,000member Association of Women's Clubs and the national chair, Sekai Holland
MDC has built upon a series of alliances by democratic and civil society organisations, the most recent being the Working Peoples Convention held in February. From May 1997, the Zimbabwe Council of Churches and the ZCTU had called together the National Constitutional Assembly. This was formally launched in January 1998, and now has 150 member organisations-of workers, farmers, women, Christians, ex-combatants, students, teachers, lesbians and gay men. The NCA is leading a strong nation-wide debate on what sort of constitution should replace the 1980