The following two charts taken from a Center for Economic Policy and Research Center study by John Schmitt and Janelle Jones highlight the distressed nature of the U.S. labor market and the need for raising the minimum wage and strengthening union organizing.
Schmitt and Jones define low wage work as that work paying $10.00 an hour or less in 2011 dollars. As the charts show, low wage workers are far more educated and older in 2011 than in 1979.
Education and experience are not sufficient to ensure a living wage.
Not surprisingly, growing numbers of low wage workers at Walmart and at chain fast food restaurants have begun engaging in direct action for higher wages and better working conditions. They deserve our support.
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Martin Hart-Landsberg is a professor of Economics and Director of the Political Economy Program at Lewis and Clark College. You can follow him at Reports from the Economic Front.
Comments 17
garrison5555 — December 11, 2012
I think the unionization has more to do with far fewer 16-19 year olds being members of the low-wage labor force. Young people working at McDonald's and Walmart used to be expected, not they have been all but eliminated from the labor market. Why is this so?
Mr. S — December 11, 2012
How are these charts proof that unions need strengthening or the minimum wage needs to be raised? That is a complete non-sequitor.
THE DISTRESSED LABOR MARKET | Welcome to the Doctor's Office — December 11, 2012
[...] from SocImages [...]
Ted_Howard — December 11, 2012
Alternatively, you could just do the sensible thing. Almost every "problem" is best resolved by some tax-subsidy scheme, rather than direct government intervention. Markets do a fantastic job of allocating resources efficiently, but we may want to intervene on distributional issues. If we believe that wages are too low from what we view as reasonable, then we should have an after-tax minimum wage (i.e. the employer's pay whatever the employees marginal product is and we redistribute money to them via some optimal non-linear income tax). This policy minimizes distortions, but you still get the redistribution.
Also, I hate the term "living wage." It's basically just a rhetoric tool that has no meaning. What if I decided tomorrow that $150 per hour is a living wage. Should we mandate employers pay $150 an hour? Why is $15 or $10 reasonable, but not $150? Or is $150 reasonable? At least make a coherent argument for why some number is desirable, preferably through a fully-specific, general equilibrium model with a utilitarian social planner, otherwise I don't take much of these numbers seriously.
Yrro Simyarin — December 11, 2012
Odd, this seems to me a natural consequence of subsidizing liberal arts degrees. You have an increased population of people (college and high school attainment has increased significantly since 1979, with most of the increase coming from the lower and middle classes) who would have been working lower income jobs before, but now have a degree... that doesn't train them to do anything more profitable.
Saba — December 11, 2012
You know what I find kind of awful? Jobs that make anything more than $10/hr are not considered "low wage". I have yet to live in a city where less than about $18/hr would give me the capacity to cover food, clothing, rent, healthcare, etc. and actually save anything.
Harlequinastronomy — December 11, 2012
Do they compute these numbers for other age groups? The workforce as a whole has gotten older and more educated; I'm wondering if this change is more or less than that experienced by thought-earning groups.
Chad W. Richardson — December 12, 2012
This "living wage" stuff is really a misnomer since it factors in electricity, rent, new clothing, gas etc. when people don't actually need most of this stuff to survive, or even meet a standard of living acceptable in many other societies.