Low-wage workers turning to voters for pay raises

[B5C]

Low-wage workers turning to voters for pay raises

For decades, Long Beach hotel workers fought for better wages.

But their efforts to start unions mostly fizzled. So last year, union backers tried something new: a ballot measure.

Voters swiftly gave them what years of picket lines and union-card drives had failed to secure — a $13-per-hour minimum wage for hundreds of Long Beach hotel workers.

A similar shift happened in San Jose, where voters in November awarded workers a higher minimum wage not just in hotels, but citywide. The victories put these two California cities on the cusp of an emerging trend: Ballot initiatives, labor experts say, have the potential to rewrite labor's playbook for how to win concessions from management.

Long Beach and San Jose join a list of cities nationwide where voters, not unions, have won workers higher wages, demonstrating the power of this new labor tactic.

The trend has built slowly. Frustrated in their efforts to fight corporations for better pay and working conditions, labor unions began turning to city councils in the 1990s to pass so-called living-wage requirements.

The efforts were small at first, usually affecting only workers employed by government contractors. But as time wore on, scores of such measures passed, eventually totaling more than 140 nationwide. As the victories mounted, proponents have grown more ambitious.

In recent years, labor activists have begun bypassing city councils altogether and taking their push for higher pay directly to voters who, polls show, often view wage increases favorably.

Nationwide, the strategy is by no means a slam-dunk — ballot campaigns are pricey and, due to ballot requirements, nearly impossible to win in some states — but in California, where a well-organized signature drive can land almost anything on the ballot, it has almost always been victorious.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-labor-new-tactic-20130310,0,4999155.story


An interesting way to fight back against employers who refuse to give works higher wages. Use direct democracy action to create a law to force employers to give higher wages.

[RadioRaheem84]

That's distorting the market by imposing wage increases the market cannot provide. The costs will passed on to the consumer. Get ready for high hotel prices, Long Beach. :grin:

[B5C]

That's distorting the market by imposing wage increases the market cannot provide. The costs will passed on to the consumer. Get ready for high hotel prices, Long Beach. :grin:

Yet, the prices are inflated manly due to being a tourist town.

[Die Neue Zeit]

BSC, finally non-unionized workers realize that immediate solutions require being political from the get-go. Forget mere labour disputes!

However, there are still shortcomings: Why were there no votes for minimum wage increases plus non-inflationary indexation? Really, won't people get tired of going to the polls every few years to raise the minimum wage (imagine if votes were held every so often to affect every wage level, while we're at it).

[RadioRaheem84]

Why were there no votes for minimum wage increases plus non-inflationary indexation?

You mean price controls? It's one thing to vote for wage increases but the latter would seem like a completely radical initiative I don't think they're thinking about.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

That's distorting the market by imposing wage increases the market cannot provide. The costs will passed on to the consumer. Get ready for high hotel prices, Long Beach. :grin:

Class struggle is like that. The point of class based politics ought to be to pass it onto the consumer, since the consumer is largely the middle and upper classes who ought to suffer from proletarian politics. The end goal being to liberate the working class by exersizing a dictatorship over all other opposing classes, which i n the short term is merely flipping capitalism on it's head.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Class struggle is like that. The point of class based politics ought to be to pass it onto the consumer, since the consumer is largely the middle and upper classes who ought to suffer from proletarian politics. The end goal being to liberate the working class by exersizing a dictatorship over all other opposing classes, which i n the short term is merely flipping capitalism on it's head.the hotels may raise prices as a show of protest, but the pressure on pricing comes from competing area hotels and this will mean that it will have to remain comparable to nearby towns... Long beach isn't exactly alone and it isn't exactly a destination spot either.

So higher wages will cut into hotel profits, but they will be bound to offer similar rates as neighboring towns. Then it is more likely that the company will try and make up lost profits not out of the consumers but out of the workers. To resist this, workers will need to actually be able to defend themselves in the workplace, not just the ballot box.

[RadioRaheem84]

Wouldn't this hurt workers by causing layoffs?

I could think of more libertarian counter arguments which they disguise as "market" correcting. Good lord, when you look at it this way has there ever been a real market reaction to class war by workers? Or has it always been just capitalists adjusting to bake up for a loss?

[Jimmie Higgins]

Wouldn't this hurt workers by causing layoffs?

I could think of more libertarian counter arguments which they disguise as "market" correcting. Good lord, when you look at it this way has there ever been a real market reaction to class war by workers? Or has it always been just capitalists adjusting to bake up for a loss?

Smaller hotels might be more impacted leading to reductions in hours, more work for the remaining workers, but often legislation like this has some kind of loophole or stipulation for employers with fewer than X number of workers.

The problem with the libertarian arguments is that they assume labor wages and the value from labor equal out. With that assumption, then more wages means higher production costs and then higher prices. But what the wages are really cutting into is the owner's cut of the surplus value. So any reaction the bosses have is a measure to regain larger percentages of that surpluss, not "cover higher production costs" as libertarians might see it. With smaller shops the impact is greater because they don't have the rates of profits that large firms have and so there is a certain way this logic would appear to be correct, but it's incorrect in regards to how the system actually works. Small businesses just have a tendency to go under in capitalism and it's the small business relationship to the larger capitalists that ultimately cuses this, not wages.

[Rooiakker]

I say we get a Maximum wage.

[Die Neue Zeit]

You mean price controls? It's one thing to vote for wage increases but the latter would seem like a completely radical initiative I don't think they're thinking about.

Not price controls: indexation of wages so that they don't get eroded by inflation and so that they are protected from deflation.

[Pretty Flaco]

Class struggle is like that. The point of class based politics ought to be to pass it onto the consumer, since the consumer is largely the middle and upper classes who ought to suffer from proletarian politics. The end goal being to liberate the working class by exersizing a dictatorship over all other opposing classes, which i n the short term is merely flipping capitalism on it's head.

Not true. The largest amount (proportionally to income) of consumption is done by poor and working class people. Poor and working people are far more likely to spend money when they receive it instead of saving. Increases in food prices, gas prices, prices of essentials, etc. most directly affect the proletarians.

[Ablearcher]

So higher wages will cut into hotel profits, but they will be bound to offer similar rates as neighboring towns. Then it is more likely that the company will try and make up lost profits not out of the consumers but out of the workers. To resist this, workers will need to actually be able to defend themselves in the workplace, not just the ballot box.

I'm not going to discount this organizing strategy without first being able to evaluate its results, both in this case and others. I don't think it's a stretch to assume that unless this increase in minimum wage is accompanied by the ratification of a union these workers will soon be facing longer hours, fewer shifts and potential layoffs to compensate for the decrease in profit which could essentially nullify any of the benefits gained by this increase. However, if they do use this opportunity to form a union than they can gain some degree of leverage, hopefully minimizing their any extra burden put on them by their employer.

[RadioRaheem84]

I'm not going to discount this organizing strategy without first being able to evaluate its results, both in this case and others. I don't think it's a stretch to assume that unless this increase in minimum wage is accompanied by the ratification of a union these workers will soon be facing longer hours, fewer shifts and potential layoffs to compensate for the decrease in profit which could essentially nullify any of the benefits gained by this increase. However, if they do use this opportunity to form a union than they can gain some degree of leverage, hopefully minimizing their any extra burden put on them by their employer.

Speaking of which, would this be the natural reaction of capital to such a change?