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Tag: Minimum Wage

Tag: Minimum Wage

Healthy Terminals: Assessing an Airports Healthcare Benefits Supplement in New Jersey and New York

April 5, 2020 / By Patrick Burns / Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ

Proposed Healthy Terminals Acts in New Jersey and New York would add a healthcare benefits supplement of $4.54 per hour, on top of the current PANYNJ minimum wage, for covered airport workers to use in purchasing quality healthcare. We estimate the legislation would affect 34,533 airport workers at Newark Liberty, LaGuardia and JFK Airports, helping many end dependence upon Medicaid.

Too Big to Govern: Public Balance Sheet for the World’s Largest Store

November 26, 2019 / By Daniel Flaming and Patrick Burns / Los Angeles County Federation of Labor

Households in the Los Angeles metro region paid $7.2 billion for packages from Amazon.com in 2018. Less publicly visible was more than $790 million paid out in public subsidies and uncompensated public costs that supported Amazon’s profitability. It is time for Amazon to come of age and pay its own way. This means paying its full costs to the communities that host it and the workers who create its profits.

Restoring Altitude: Economic Impacts of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Minimum Wage Proposal

June 18, 2018 / By Patrick Burns, Halil Toros and Daniel Flaming / Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ

The Port Authority that oversees LaGuardia, the John F. Kennedy and Newark Liberty international airports is considering a proposal that would raise the minimum wage for 40,000 low wage workers at regional airports to $19 per hour by 2023. If passed, it will create the highest publicly mandated minimum wage in the nation and will deeply impact local communities. An economic stimulus is projected in the communities where workers live. Their increased household spending is projected to increase economic output by over $465 million in 2023 and every year thereafter, creating 2,700 new jobs.

Working for the Mouse: A Survey of Disneyland Resort Employees

February 27, 2018 / By Peter Dreier, Daniel Flaming, Lucero Herrera, Martha Matsuoka, Jane Carlen and Patrick Burns / The Coalition of Resort Labor Unions

Disneyland Resort is the most iconic theme park in the world. Disney’s best-known characters are present in the park and woven into America’s national culture, recognized and celebrated around the world. People share more photographs from their visits to Disneyland than from any other place in the world, making it the most Instagrammed location on earth. However, employees report high instances of homelessness, food insecurity, ever-shifting work schedules, extra-long commutes, and low wages.

Flying Right: Giving U.S. Airport Workers a Lift

June 21, 2017 / By Patrick Burns, Halil Toros and Daniel Flaming / Service Employees International Union

Creating a $15 minimum wage at U.S. airports will provide transformative economic benefits for low-paid air transportation employees who work 24-7 in a fast-paced, noisy environment, providing essential services for airlines and the traveling public. The $15 wage will also generate job growth in businesses where airport workers spend their wages, lift many out of poverty, reduce dependence on public assistance, and boost tax revenues that pay for crucial government services.

Long Beach Rising: A City that Works for Everyone

October 13, 2015 / By Daniel Flaming, Halil Toros and Patrick Burns / AFL-CIO, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor

Over 54,000 workers employed in Long Beach’s formal economy will be affected by increasing the minimum wage to $15. The annual earnings of workers will increase by about $405 million. The largest share of increased wages—almost $130 million—will go to workers who also live in the City of Long Beach The greatest number of affected workers and the largest payroll increases will be in restaurants, retail trade, education, transportation and warehousing, and health care. The economic stimulus from increased consumption by workers' households will create an estimated 3,186 new jobs and generate $442 million in increased sales in the region.

Sustain Los Angeles: Industry Greenhouse Gas and Wage Sustainability

May 11, 2015 / By Daniel Flaming and Patrick Burns / California Energy Commission

Communities in Los Angeles County have a new set of tools for land use decisions and development policies that decrease greenhouse gas emissions and improve workers’ wages. A report by the Economic Roundtable, Industry Greenhouse Gas and Wage Sustainability, identifies the climate change effects as well as the wage sustainability of jobs in each industry.

Los Angeles Rising: A City That Works for Everyone

March 19, 2015 / By Daniel Flaming, Halil Toros, Yvonne Yen Liu, Patrick Burns, Lucero Herrera, UCLA Labor Center, Tia Koonse, UCLA Labor Center, Saba Waheed, UCLA Labor Center and Robert Habans, UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment / Los Angeles County Federation of Labor

Raising L.A.'s minimum wage to $15.25 per hour will put $5.9 billion new dollars into the pockets of workers and families, and provide stimulus benefits for under-invested communities. Paying fair wages is an adjustment for some businesses, but the result is a bigger, more sustainable, and more inclusive economy for Los Angeles.

Repaying Hospitality: Economic Impacts of Raising Hotel Workers Wages and Benefits in the City of Los Angeles

December 1, 2013 / By Patrick Burns and Daniel Flaming / Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy

A $15.37 minimum wage for Los Angeles hotels with 100 or more rooms would affect over 5,000 low-wage hotel workers, including housekeepers, janitors, banquet servers, bellhops and desk clerks. The twenty year trend for hotel growth and rising hotel occupancy and revenue support the finding that the proposed new minimum wage is feasible for the hotel industry in Los Angeles.

Effects of a Fifteen Dollar an Hour Minimum Wage in the City of Los Angeles

November 1, 2013 / By Daniel Flaming / AFL-CIO, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor

America has lost ground on the intent declared by Congress when the Fair Labor Standards Act was enacted in 1938, that workers will receive wages sufficient to maintain "the minimum standard of living necessary for health, efficiency, and general well-being." The federal minimum wage had the greatest value in 1968. Set at $1.60 an hour, it had a value of $10.51 in 2012 dollars. The current federal minimum wage of $7.25 is worth 31 percent less. This wage attrition is part of most people's everyday experience. Three-quarters of the full-time labor force residing in the City of Los Angeles earn less than comparable workers 30 years ago.

Impacts of Living Wages in the Airport Hospitality Enhancement Zone

December 8, 2010 / By Daniel Flaming and Patrick Burns / City of Los Angeles Administrative Officer

This study of the Airport Hospitality Enhancement Zone examines the economic impacts of minimum compensation requirements, outcomes from the non-tiered living wage requirement for both tipped and non-tipped hotel workers, and the costs and possible benefits of training for hotel workers. Hotels in the Airport Hospitality Zone are called upon by the City to pay workers a minimum of $10.30 an hour and $1.25 per hour in health benefits, or $11.55 an hour if health benefits are not provided.

On the Edge: A Progress Report on Welfare to Work in Los Angeles

January 1, 1999 / By Daniel Flaming, Mark Drayse and Peter Force / Economic Roundtable

The loss of a welfare safety net for most adults for most of their lives makes the quality of jobs available to the working poor and their success in finding and keeping jobs increasingly important. The economic and civic life of the Los Angeles region will be shaped by connections that are made, or fail to be made, between the growing ranks of working poor and opportunities for steady, sustaining, productive employment.