(U-WIRE) BERKELEY, Calif. — More than 55 percent of black workers in the United States have low-wage jobs with sparse benefits and little upward mobility, according to a study released this weekend by the University of California at Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education.
Entitled “Job Quality and Black Workers,” the study uses data from the 2000 U.S. Census to show how the employment of black workers in low-wage positions adversely affects them.
Steven Pitts, a labor policy specialist at the center and the author of the study, said that the abundance of low-wage jobs goes unnoticed due to policymakers’ often singular focus on just alleviating unemployment.
“Unemployment is basically someone who doesn’t have a job looking for a job but can’t find or want one,” Pitts said. “The job training and other programs we have now help those people but do nothing to help those stuck in low-wage jobs.”
According to regional low-wage thresholds from the 2000 Census, 56.5 percent of black workers are in low-wage jobs.
By contrast, 43.9 percent of white workers fell below the same low-wage thresholds.
The study points to retail as a particularly problematic sector where black workers are stuck in “dead-end” jobs.
This problem of low-wage retail employment is not only left untreated, but is exacerbated when large retail outlets such as Wal-Mart stores open in metropolitan counties. Average earnings per general retail worker were found to slip approximately 0.8 percent with the opening of a large retail store in the area.
The study prescribes several policy-based solutions to address problems of low-wage work, unemployment and regional development.
“We need to increase the quality of jobs for the workers that are in these situations by promoting unionization, enforcing labor standards and living wage laws,” Pitts said.
The study cites misapplication or a general lack of enforcement of labor and wage policy as the catalyst in the creation of what the study calls “an informal sweatshop economy in most cities.”
Pitts points to industry-specific wage policy as a possible source of alleviation from the systemic “dead-end” jobs found in retail and similar industries.
“They passed a ‘big box’ ordinance in Chicago, where if you have a store with a certain square footage, you have to provide a certain level of payment and benefits, but the mayor vetoed it,” Pitts said. “Such policy could allow retail workers to actually earn a living wage.”
Similar legislation was recently enacted in Emeryville, Calif., regarding hotel industry employees, guaranteeing wage and work environment protection for hotel workers, Pitts said.
“The black community in the United States faces a complex employment crisis in the United States, and our response needs to reflect this,” Pitts said.