Calculations back up the sentiment that $5.15 per hour isn’t enough to support a family—$5.15 simply doesn’t meet the Self- Sufficiency Standard, which calculates how much money working adults need to meet their basic needs without any subsidies of any kind.21 Taking San Francisco as an example, the hourly Self-Sufficiency Standard wage rate needed by two working adults to support themselves, along with a preschool age child and a child in school, has been calculated at $14.27 per hour per adult.22
The federal minimum wage is currently so far from being high enough to provide people with sufficient money to meet basic needs, that many are taking the fight for fair wages to their own backyards by working on local living wage campaigns. Across the country advocates are working hard in local jurisdictions.
Stephanie Luce, who teaches in the University of Massachusetts’ Labor Studies department, explains it this way: “The United States is the richest country in the history of the world and yet a quarter to a third of American workers work for an hourly wage that is not enough for them to meet the federal poverty line. So we’re talking up to 40 million workers earning quite low wages because we know that even the federal poverty line has been judged by experts to be too low to accurately judge poverty. The living wage movement is basically a movement of campaigns run by community and labor groups to raise wages for workers through legislation, initiatives, contract negotiations, and any other avenue open to workers.”
These living wage campaigns often work through local governments to pass standards that say, for example, city governments will set a floor for their wages that is closer to a living wage, and will only work with contractors that pay a living wage. Dr. Luce comments, “In my research, I’ve come up with a rough estimate that suggests workers have received three quarters of a billion dollars in wage increases through these efforts in 130 cities.” For instance, after a campaign for the city of San Francisco to pay living wages to their contractors and leaseholders, 370s were made with the workers at the San Francisco International Airport when they adopted a Quality Standards Program that set wage floors (otherwise known as a minimum wage) for contractors. This was a big improvement in the pay scale of people who worked for the city at the airport.
Here’s what happened: The national average pay for preboarding airport security screeners was $6 per hour, and those security jobs had extremely high turnover rates (the national average turnover was 125 percent in 1999)—jeopardizing what the job is meant to do, which is provide security.23 The pay floor was increased to $10 per hour if they received benefits and to $11.25 per hour if they didn’t have benefits.24
This new pay floor at the airport made a huge difference, improving both airport security performance and lives of the workers at the same time. A study of the impact of that living wage pay raise found that annual turnover of airport security workers dropped from 110 percent to 25 percent, and one security contracting firm reported in an even lower 15 percent turnover. The study also found improved job performance with a decline in absenteeism, as well as in disciplinary problems. 25 The cost of this living wage program was estimated to be a small $1.37 price increase to airline passengers.26 That cost, compared to the benefits workers gained and improved airport security performance, makes 370s like these no-brainers.