Living Wage Movements: Global Perspective (Advances in Social Economics)

251 Pages·2004·0.79 MB·English

by  Deborah M. Figart

Living Wage Movements
“In this volume, Professor Figart has drawn together 18 scholars for the
first comprehensive global analysis of the various living wages movements.
These essays bring to life the story of the distributive conditions of labor,
through global activism and empirical research. It provides a fascinating
detailed view of the ethical, political, economic and social foundations of
the standard of living of the working classes in many nations. I highly rec-
ommend it for courses on labor economics, public policy and comparative
political economy.”
Professor Phillip O’Hara, Global Political Economy Research Unit,
Curtin University, Australia
Living wage activism has spanned time and space, reaching across decades
and national boundaries. Conditions generating living wage movements
early in the twentieth century have resurfaced in the twenty-first century,
only on a global scale: “sweated” labor, macroeconomic instability, and
job insecurity.
The original essays in this volume assess the movement for higher living
standards in the USA, Canada, Europe, and Australasia. Each of the indi-
vidual chapter authors has extensive experience in academia or research
institutes, in public policy, or in the labor movement. A variety of inno-
vative efforts to achieve living wages are profiled. Minimum wage
increases, labor code activism, low pay campaigns, and fair wage clauses,
for example, have begun to reverse a growing two-tiered labor market.
Women, workers from racial and ethnic minority groups, and employees
in service and sales occupations have been noteworthy beneficiaries.
Upon reviewing the empirical evidence, the book’s contributors make
strong cases both for and against living wage activism. The effective blend
of historical, contemporary, and global perspectives provides opportun-
ities for teachers, scholars, and activists to evaluate how we can address
low pay at the organizational and macroeconomic levels.
Deborah M. Figart is Professor of Economics at Richard Stockton
College, USA.
Advances in social economics
Edited by John B. Davis
Marquette University
This series presents new advances and developments in social economics
thinking on a variety of subjects that concern the link between social
values and economics. Need, justice and equity, gender, cooperation, work
poverty, the environment, class, institutions, public policy and methodol-
ogy are some of the most important themes. Among the orientations of
the authors are social economist, institutionalist, humanist, solidarist,
cooperatist, radical and Marxist, feminist, post-Keynesian, behavioralist,
and environmentalist. The series offers new contributions from today’s
most foremost thinkers on the social character of the economy.
Published in conjunction with the Association of Social Economics.
Books published in the series include:
Social Economics
Premises, findings and policies
Edited by Edward J. O’Boyle
The Environmental Consequences of Growth
Steady-state economics as an alternative to ecological decline
Douglas Booth
The Human Firm
A socio-economic analysis of its behaviour and potential in a new
economic age
John Tomer
Economics for the Common Good
Two centuries of economic thought in the humanist tradition
Mark A. Lutz
Working Time
International trends, theory and policy perspectives
Edited by Lonnie Golden and Deborah M. Figart
The Social Economics of Health Care
John Davis
Reclaiming Evolution
A Marxist institutionalist dialogue on social change
William M. Dugger and Howard J. Sherman
The Theory of the Individual in Economics
Identity and value
John Davis
Boundaries of Clan and Color
Transnational comparisons of inter-group disparity
Edited by William Darity Jnr. and Ashwini Deshpande
Living Wage Movements
Global perspectives
Edited by Deborah M. Figart
Living Wage Movements
Global perspectives
Edited by Deborah M. Figart
First published 2004
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004.
© 2004 Selection and editorial matter, Deborah M. Figart;
individual chapters, the contributors
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested
ISBN 0-203-62945-0 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-67062-0 (Adobe eReader Format)
ISBN 0-415-32002-X (Print Edition)
Contents
List of illustrations ix
Notes on contributors xi
Acknowledgments xv
List of abbreviations xvii
1 Introduction to living wages around the globe 1
D E B O R A H M . F I G A R T
PART I
What is a living? 13
2 The right to an individual living wage 15
J O H N A . R Y A N
3 Wages and hours: historical and contemporary linkages 27
E L L E N M U T A R I A N D D E B O R A H M . F I G A R T
4 Living wage laws and the case for a targeted wage subsidy 43
D A V I D A . M A C P H E R S O N
5 The determination of living wages 51
D A V I D H . C I S C E L
PART II
Living wage and low pay campaigns: contemporary global
activism 67
6 The living wage movement mushrooms in the United States 69
D A V I D B . R E Y N O L D S
viii Contents
7 Organizing homeworkers in Toronto’s garment industry 85
J O N A T H A N E A T O N A N D A L E X D A G G
8 Living wage and low pay campaigns in Britain 101
D A M I A N P . G R I M S H A W
9 The living wage in Australia: history, recent developments,
and current challenges 122
J O H N B U C H A N A N , I A N W A T S O N , A N D
G A B R I E L L E M E A G H E R
10 The fight for living standards in New Zealand 138
P R U E H Y M A N
PART III
Evidence and lessons from US empirical studies 155
11 The Miami living wage ordinance: primary and secondary
effects 157
B R U C E N I S S E N
12 Minimum wages and living wages: raising incomes by
mandating wage floors 171
D A V I D N E U M A R K
13 The economic impact of living wage ordinances 188
M A R K D . B R E N N E R
14 Living wages in US communities: an analysis of costs of
services and economic development 210
A N D R E W J . E L M O R E
Index 225
Illustrations
Figure
9.1 Living wage claims and Australian Industrial Relations
Commission safety net decisions, 1997–2003 129
Tables
5.1 US poverty thresholds for 2002 54
5.2 Living wage budgets for single-parent families with two
children 59
5.3 The labor hours required to earn a living wage in Memphis,
Tennessee 63
8.1 Evidence of low pay among private cleaning contractors 105
8.2 Recommended and accepted minimum wage rates,
1999–2003 108
8.3 Percentage increase in average hourly earnings, 1998–2002 109
8.4 The relative level of the National Minimum Wage,
1999–2002 110
9.1 Key features of the ACTU’s living wage claim 126
9.2 Labor market coverage of different forms of industrial
regulation and average annual wage increases, 1996 127
9.3 Wage growth among low-paid workers, 1989–99 130
9.4 Change in weekly total earnings of full-time adult
non-managerial employees, 1996–2000 131
10.1 Minimum wage levels in New Zealand 144
12.1 Minimum wage workers and low-income families 177
12.2 Percentage change in proportions of families in ranges of
income-to-needs distribution, minimum wage increase vs.
no increase 178
12.3 Effects of living wage laws 180
12.4 Estimates of effects of contractor living wages on wages of
below-median wage workers 183
13.1 Economic impact of various living wage ordinances:
prospective evidence 194