One fair wage

Following the post at reference 1, I have now got around to reading the book at reference 2 about wages in sectors which are largely exempt from minimum wage legislation in the US, with a lot of the exemption arising from the tips which are supposed to supplement the wages. Sectors which employ a lot of women, a lot of people of colour and a lot of immigrants, these last often undocumented and so especially vulnerable. While drivers are often exempt by being self-employed. Some of these sectors are also very competitive, with managers (or managing computer systems) who push too hard and customers who can be both rude and mean.

A slim book of under 200 pages which, apart from some topping and tailing. is made up of 8 substantive chapters each covering one or two workers in one of the sectors concerned, summarised in the snap above. A bit repetitive, but an easy enough read. Part of a lengthy campaign to mandate a proper, universal, minimum wage without all kinds of exemptions. A campaign which does seem to be making some headway.

The sectors

Servers and bussers in restaurants, where we might call a server a waiter or waitress and a busser is a sort of low grade server. Trades where low wages are supplemented by tips, leaving the workers in a very weak position vis-à-vis both management and customers. Sexually abusive behaviour if not actual sexual abuse is common. Complicated by the fact that male customers will tip female waitresses better if these last play the game. 

Parking attendants and skycaps. Cold, wet winters and hot summers. Expected to be smartly turned out, deferential and helpful – but rarely paid the rate for the job. 

Manicure and pedicure. Another industry dominated by young female immigrants, partly if not largely paid in tips. Lots of chemicals and often unhealthy working conditions.

Prisoners are usually paid derisory wages and often subject to rather rough management. Not a popular group, but I was left thinking that if they were to work in more normal conditions, they might be better prepared for life outside.

Drivers are notionally self-employed and have little of the protection afforded employees – including minimum wage. They are often driven by computer systems, systems which are apt to drive too hard, regardless of weather and traffic conditions. So another unhealthy industry. And the customers are all too happy to play along, getting their services on the cheap from people who are almost invisible.

Workers with disabilities are another group who are often on very low wages – but a group whose cost of living may well be higher than that of others. In common decency, we need to find a better way.

I associate to the closure of the farms and workshops that used to be run in many of our mental hospitals. Farms and workshops which were thought of by managers as a useful form of occupational therapy and a useful supplement to hospital budgets. But by trade unions as abuse which was taking jobs from their members.

And lastly we have young workers, often paid a lot less than adult wages for doing adult work.

I associate here to the now more or less vanished apprentice system in this country, whereby young men accepted low wages for a term of years in return for being trained to a trade. Barring student nurses, I don’t think that young women were bound in this way.

Comment

Jayaraman skirts around the natural desire of employers to employ geeks (like me) to interact with computer screens and to employ personable and pleasant people to interact with their customers.

I was brought up a bit short in the chapter about bussing, by a bit (on page 62) about how immigrants working tables in restaurants get fed up with the continual inquiries about their accents and where they came from. Brought up short, because this is something that I do, to my mind only intending to make contact, to make conversation. A bit of friendly contact. But it seems that it may not be quite like that for the people on the other end of this not very symmetrical exchange.

In the chapter about an adult illegal from Mexico, we learn that it is not just white employers who treat illegals badly. Employers who are Mexican themselves are apt to do it too, although, to be fair, they are also more apt to be sympathetic than whites.

Conclusions

A useful and accessible reminder that there is still a way to go in treating workers in these service industries properly. Not forgetting the customers who will have to accept that they have been getting service on the cheap.

From where I associate to the cook in a Bayswater pub who told me all about commuting back to Milton Keynes after the pub shut at night. He seemed quite cheerful about it, but perhaps that was not the whole story. See towards the end of reference 3.

PS 1: and lest we get too smug here in the UK, two correspondents have pointed out that restaurant work is as bad here as it is over there.

PS 2: there are other industries which use a lot of immigrants and a lot of people of colour and which I imagine can be pretty rough too, but which are not covered in this book. For example, hotels, domestic service, agricultural work and meat processing plants.

PS 3: I find this morning that the useful service from Amazon whereby I could read a lot of the books that I had bought from them on my laptop seems to have vanished. I remember it as being called the Cloud Reader. But no cause for complaint as it was a freebie. An irritation nonetheless along with the irritation caused by their continually pushing for me to sign up with Prime.

References 

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/05/starbucks-reserve-roastery.html. Clerical error in page name! An error which cannot be corrected once made.

Reference 2: One Fair Wage: Ending subminimum pay in America – Saru Jayaraman – 2021.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/04/edgware-road.html.