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The
Living Wage Movement: It’s About More than Just Wages Writing on Living Wage in the May 2002 issue of The Witness, Walter Brueggeman observes of God’s rescue of the enslaved Israelites as told in the Exodus story: "That rescue, however, was not an easy miracle. It was accomplished through tedious, nerve-wracking negotiations led by Moses, supported and authorized by God. In some part, this emancipation of the helpless poor who became Israel is accomplished by human agency that refused to accept degrading poverty and economic injustice as a permanent or legitimate social condition." Brueggeman’s description of the prolonged facedown between Moses and the Pharaoh before the Israelites were liberated is an apt template for the growing living wage movement around the country. It is apt not only in the great effort it demands, but also in the vision of new hope that is empowering it–a refusal to accept degrading poverty and injustice as an ongoing social condition. And we can be encouraged by the progress: a new national study released in March shows that living wage laws are not only attracting increasing support (with over 80 now enacted since 1994 and dozens more pending), but are actually working to reduce poverty levels. Moreover, the religious community is increasingly getting involved. But what is the importance of the living wage issue anyway? How significant is it in the larger scheme of critical social justice issues facing the Church, such as hunger, poverty, racism, sexism and the justice of the economic system itself? It may be helpful to look first at the term itself: living wage.
Unlike the term "minimum wage", which is an economic category, the notion of a "living wage" has a moral connotation. Behind it is a simple but powerful premise, namely that anyone who works fulltime for a living should not have to raise a family in poverty. But it is not yet widely recognized that living wage campaigns and the strategy driving the leading advocates of the movement embrace much more than just the aim of raising the wages of low-income workers. The movement embraces a larger vision and is basically about three things: power, the distribution of power, and the responsibility of government to ensure that fairness and justice prevail in our cities and communities (and ultimately in our nation). Let us consider them. First, power. In the living wage campaigns that I am familiar with it is most importantly low-wage workers themselves who begin to discover that they are not powerless–that as they become involved in a campaign they begin to recover their own dignity as workers, and together begin to exercise power. And for us as religious leaders it is invariably a deeply moving experience (which even after many years of involvement frequently brings tears to my eyes) to hear a worker address a rally and speak from the heart about his or her work and family situation, and to give voice to their determination to change it. That is worker power–a wondrous thing to behold.
As clergy and lay people, our solidarity with workers in their struggle also reveals another kind of power, the real power that clergy and laity discover we have as we stand with these workers, praying with them and strengthening them spiritually simply by our presence; and witnessing also before the public that this is what God’s love for the world means in practice. Moreover, this moral power of clergy leadership reveals itself in another venue when we go before city councils to demand justice and a living wage for our brothers and sisters in the human community. So firstly, these struggles for a living wage, rightly conceived and executed, are unique opportunities to support ordinary working people in their work lives as they discover and use collectively the power they have over their own lives.
Secondly, the living wage movement is about the redistribution of power. Living wage ordinances impose a condition upon businesses which seek lucrative city contracts or subsidies (frequently amounting to sums in the many millions of dollars–the citizens’ tax money, we should be reminded) when they do business with the city. The condition is that they must pay a living wage to their workers, plus health benefits, and usually, paid vacation and sick days (the latter being benefits seldom given to low wage workers). Albeit modest, these requirements constitute a palpable redistribution of power, for they assume that the business community can afford the cost increase despite its invariably great resistance, accompanied by dire predictions of economic disaster should such legislation pass. But after passage of the living wage law it becomes evident that businesses do not collapse and leave town and that they are quite able to give up a modicum of economic power and remain profitable. Third, the living wage movement is helping spotlight the fundamental responsibility of government to ensure that fairness and justice for all prevail in our communities. It would seem that this simple truth needs no reinforcing; after all, these values are deeply embedded in our national history. But they have been all but forgotten in recent times in the boundless pursuit of economic gain and the concomitant disparagement of government. The strategy for implementing living wage laws thus involves aggressively pushing our elected officials to take a stand on the critical issues facing so many working poor families in our cities and counties, and reminding them of their basic public charge, that of "promoting the general welfare." And as living wage campaigns keep gaining momentum across the country this reminder gets reinforced and begins to percolate upwards to state and national levels. To sum up the importance of the living wage movement as a social justice issue: it is clearly an issue which begins to address the larger systemic issues facing us. It addresses hunger, racism, sexism, economic injustice and the powerlessness of those at the bottom of the ladder, who are disproportionately people of color and women. All of these issues, needless to say, are deeply intertwined with the present tolerance of an unjust economic order. Where to turn for more information on how to become involved in this issue? It is helpful to know that the two most recent General Conventions of the Episcopal Church have passed resolutions supporting our involvement both in living wage campaigns in our communities, and our need to pay the Church’s own employees a living wage. More importantly, both in interfaith collaboration and within the Episcopal Church there has already been significant involvement in living wage campaigns, most prominently in the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, which has acquired a large body of experience, from its own clergy and laity on up to its bishops.
Work on a living wage campaign is of course complex and demanding. Happily there are ample resources which can provide a great deal of information and advice for newcomers to the issue. The best website for living wage information is that of ACORN, a sophisticated community action organization at the national level. Another is the website of the National Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice. For detailed economic analysis at both national and state levels that focuses on low income and unemployment as priorities, the Economic Policy Institute is indispensable. Finally, the Episcopal Network for Economic Justice is actively planning to broaden the involvement of the Episcopal Church in issues of living wage and worker justice. As chair of ENEJ’s advocacy committee I am anxious to be of assistance.
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The
Rev. Canon Dick Gillett is minister for social justice in the Episcopal
Diocese of Los
Angeles and a long time advocate for economic justice. Dick may be reached
by email at