Sunday, July 15, 2007

Living Wage A Fair Deal

.
    EDITORIALS: Three years ago, when Santa Fe's City Council first began considering raising the minimum wage for workers in the city's biggest employers, the business community reacted with outrage. The Chamber of Commerce and others predicted the increase would have disastrous effects on the city's economy and force many businesses to close. After the "living wage" ordinance was passed in 2004, a number of business owners sued to prevent the law from taking effect.
    On Thursday, that same business community— including the chamber, the hotel and restaurant associations and the Santa Fe Business Alliance representing small locally owned businesses— stood united with union representatives, Mayor David Coss and a majority of the City Council in proposing to extend the living wage to all workers in the city.
    That's quite a turnaround. Not surprisingly, it's the result of a compromise: The business community has agreed to support the new $9.50 minimum for everybody if labor and living wage supporters will drop efforts to get the minimum raised to $10.50 next year.
    Critics say that, by agreeing to drop the $10.50 bid, labor and living wage supporters have caved in to business interests. But we think the compromise— a living wage that covers every single worker in the city, not just those who work for the city's biggest employers, as the law currently mandates— instead represents a significant victory for labor.
    For one thing, the $10.50 minimum would have required another vote of the city council before it could take effect. At least one councilor is on record as saying that there wouldn't have been enough votes on the council to get the higher minimum enacted. That assessment may be accurate: the council already voted to water down the original living wage ordinance, under which the increase to $10.50 an hour was automatic, by requiring another full council vote on the issue.
    Moreover, the $9.50 minimum, now in effect just for Santa Fe employers with more than 25 workers, is the nation's highest that extends broadly into the private sector. Making it apply to all workers, instead of just a few, is fair, equitable and a boost for workers not currently covered.
    In addition, even if the new ordinance is approved, the minimum wage will continue to rise here in Santa Fe after 2009, when an annual cost-of-living provision will take effect.
    Compared with recent efforts by the state Legislature and Congress to raise the minimum wage, Santa Fe looks positively progressive. The Legislature raised the state minimum to $7.50 an hour and Congress approved a $7.25 minimum nationally, both to be phased in over the next two years.
    If the City Council approves the proposed new ordinance, all Santa Fe workers will have won a good deal well ahead of workers elsewhere. To the extent that his administration has helped broker that deal, Mayor Coss deserves their appreciation.