Free Republic

Michigan’s “prevailing wage” law costs residents more than $224 million each year, according to the Anderson Economic Group. Now there’s a website that brings the impact of that even closer to home. Created by the Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) of Michigan, the new site, www.TimeForRepeal.com/waste-calculator/, lets people learn the cost of prevailing wage mandates for individual school districts. ABC of Michigan, which represents commercial, governmental and industrial construction industries, has consistently advocated for eliminating the state’s prevailing wage law, which essentially requires construction firms doing work for the government to pay union scale wages and follow union work rules....

There are millions of low-wage immigrant workers across the United States who make life easier for professionals in various ways. These immigrants prepare and serve meals, clean homes and offices, care for children and aging parents and grandparents, drive passengers to and fro, and, among many other things, clean, trim, and paint nails. Over the past few days, Sarah Maslin Nir’s two-part report in the New York Times on labor conditions in America’s burgeoning manicure industry has attracted a great deal of attention, and for good reason. Nir’s work is a powerful reminder that low-wage immigrant workers aren’t always treated...

...After seeing CNN's story Friday on Charles Gladden -- a man who works in the Senate cafeteria but lives on the streets -- Nathan Morris, the co-founder of musical group Boyz II Men, started an online call to arms to help. Using a crowd-funding site "Go Fund Me," Morris urged people to make a donation to help Gladden find housing.... ...Gladden, 63, makes about $11 an hour, and takes home about $360 a week. But he said he gives a lot of it to his children and grandchildren, who have their own financial troubles. "I take care of them," he...

A survey targeting local low-income families has found that 40 percent of respondents felt they have very little or no job security, according to results being released this week. That kind of instability makes it challenging to commit to car loans, apartment leases and tuition payments – steps often necessary to improving a family’s economic standing. Of those participating in the survey, more than 1 in 2 has received free groceries or meals and about 1 in 4 has needed help with housing, utilities or health care. The 502 responses reflect the experiences of those who continue to struggle in...

Wages of America's middle class have dropped below 1970s levels as immigration has surged 325 percent, according to a new congressional report that questions claims that native Americans are economically helped by greater immigration. The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service report studied immigration and middle class income from 1945-2013 and found that as immigration slowed between 1945 and 1970, American incomes increased. But when immigration expanded, the incomes of the bottom 90 percent of Americans went flat and then dropped beginning in 2000. In the report to the Senate Judiciary Committee, the CRS reported that the foreign-born population of the United...

Ever since Scott Walker began engaging on the national stage, he’s been dogged by questions about his policies on immigration. The Wisconsin governor admits that his position has changed from a few years ago, a change he attributes to having more opportunity to study the issue now that the cycle of elections in Wisconsin has finally played all the way out. Still, Walker has had some trouble defining the issue in a way that makes him stand out from the field.Did he succeed last night? In an interview with Sean Hannity, Walker said that immigration policy should have as...

Friday, the Labor Department is expected to report the economy added 247,000 jobs in March down from 295,000 in February and 324,000 during the fourth quarter. Wages, for all but the most skilled professionals, continue to advance only slowly, and going forward good paying jobs and pay raises will likely be even scarcer for struggling middle and working class Americans. The headline unemployment rate is down to 5.5 percent, from the recession high of 10, largely because fewer adults are participating in the labor force—for example, the 7 million men ages 25 to 55 that neither have a job nor...

Shanna Tippen was another hourly worker at the bottom of the nation’s economy, looking forward to a 25-cent bump in the Arkansas minimum wage that would make it easier for her to buy diapers for her grandson. When I wrote about her in the Post last month, she said the minimum wage hike would bring her a bit of financial relief, but it wouldn’t lift her above the poverty line. She called me the other day to say she didn’t get to enjoy the 25-cent hike for long. After the story came out, she says she was fired from her...

Over the past 2 years the Obama administration has been desperate to boost minimum wages, usually over tedious bickering with republicans and corporations who have resisted such an increase, with neither party realizing that such a measure would not do much to actually boost aggregate spending. Instead, what Obama should have been focusing on was to limit the maximum number of hours worked per week, because as the following chart shows, the reason why weekly pay is rising and aggregate earnings is not due to an increase in hourly wages but because Americans are simply working longer hours every...

...the next time anyone asks why there is no broad-based pick up in consumer retail spending across the entire population, just show them the above charts.

Leftists love to constantly spout off about the “war on women” by conservatives and Republicans. Because, you know, we hate women if we believe they shouldn’t murder their unborn children or something. They also claim women are discriminated against in the workplace by making less money than men, again spewing nonsense and incomplete facts in order to persuade women to vote Democrat. The only problem is, if you look at the statistics involving women in the workforce, you start to see it’s really the loony left that has a war on women. From CNS News: A record 56,023,000 women, age...

Alberta wages almost 25% higher than Canadian average Economists, politicians and business leaders seek ways to bring wages down Springtime is typically oilpatch bonus season. As the grass turns green, car dealerships and upscale stores tend to get busier. This year is different. Bonuses — if they exist at all — are expected to be small. Wages have been frozen. Oilpatch workers are happy to have a job at all. And that's the private sector. Public sector workers, like teachers and nurses, are on high alert as the provincial government makes increasingly loud noises about reopening their contracts to cut...

Yesterday, Walmart announced that, beginning in April of this year, the company will raise the pay of all its employees to at least $9 an hour. In 2016, the company’s minimum pay rate will again jump to $10. This move will affect approximately 500,000 Walmart employees and, along with several other changes such as increased training and scheduling options, is estimated to cost the company $1 billion. Walmart’s pay increase follows a number of businesses, including Aetna, Ikea and Gap Inc., that have announced an internal company minimum wage higher than the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour. While some...

resident Barack Obama, in his State of the Union speech, called for a minimum-wage hike and for government-mandated paid family and medical leave. "We are the only advanced country on Earth," said the President, "that doesn't guarantee paid sick leave or paid maternity leave to our workers." On the minimum wage, Obama issued this challenge: "And to everyone in this Congress who still refuses to raise the minimum wage, I say this: If you truly believe you could work full-time and support a family on less than $15,000 a year, try it. If not, vote to give millions of the...

W orking professionals across sectors might not have much to cheer this year as salary increases likely to see a “marginal” rise compared with last year’s pay hikes in India. According to a study released today by global management consultancy Hay Group, employees across job roles can expect an average of 11.3 percent wage hike in 2015 led by FMCG and chemical industry. Last year, the actual average salary increase was recorded at 10.9 percent across industries, the report noted. “The study that we have conducted predicts that the pay raise in 2015 will remain in double digits. At this...

Michigan’s prevailing wage law sets an arbitrary mandate for what public entities (like schools) have to pay for construction projects. Top Republicans in Lansing rightly want to eliminate these mandates, as the Mackinac Center has recommended for years. This is estimated to save taxpayers more than $200 million per year. Democrats disagree with the proposed changes. "It's extremely disappointing that the first priority of Republicans is to lower wages and have people work for less," said House Minority Leader Tim Greimel, D-Auburn Hills. "It's just another example of Republicans' relentless push for cheap labor." But if government can set an...

The elation over wage increases in private business reported in last month’s job report has been replaced by disappointment. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Jan. 16 that average hourly earnings fell five cents in December, eating up most of the six-cent increase in November. Between 2010 and 2014, the average real wage fell 1.1%, a poor showing after rising 3.4% between 2006 and 2010. What accounts for this performance? There are basically two ways that the average economywide wage can fall. There might be a shift in employment away from high-paying to lower-paying industries; in other words, the...

The great wage mystery deepens. In economic recoveries, there usually comes a time when strong job gains lead to strong wage gains. Businesses must pay more to recruit and retain the workers they need. Not this time - or at least not yet. The unemployment rate has dropped from a peak of 10 percent in October 2009 to 5.6 percent at the end of 2014. But hourly wage gains haven't accelerated. They've plodded along at about a 2 percent annual rate, roughly matching inflation. Economists are baffled. "This labor market recovery looks different from anything since World War II," says University...

Much of the discussion of last Tuesday's election results has addressed voters' ongoing dissatisfaction with what, by the numbers, is an improving economy. Commenters like Slate's William Saletan noted that Republicans won by using liberal-sounding economic rhetoric to play on income-stagnation angst. President Obama talked about the issue in a press conference, citing the dearth of high-wage jobs amidst the recovery. Today Josh Marshall of the progressive news and commentary site Talking Points Memo and Derek Thompson of the Atlantic poke deeper into the issue. They really poke the heck out of the issue, I tell you! Marshall's piece is...

While the headline jobs print was a modest kneejerk disappointment at least until it is appropriately spun in some sort of "goldilocks" frame, where the October jobs report was a true disappointment, was in the report of average hourly earnings: rising at just 0.1% for the month and 2.0% Y/Y, it missed expectations across both metrics. As a reminder, even Janet Yellen has observed that with the unemployment rate ridiculously low and thus meaningless to shape policy, the key thing the Fed head is watching is any changes in wages to determine where benign wage inflation is headed. Well,...