High-Rise Wages

The nation's first "living wage building" lifts custodians out of poverty and into economic stability.

Baltimore

Willie Lee has held down two full-time, low-paying jobs for the past five years. Working back-to-back eight-hour shifts, five days a week left her exhausted. Juggling bill after bill left her broke.

But Lee just got close to a 50 percent raise. She is among 25 custodians-AFSCME Local 1711 members-in Baltimore's World Trade Center who now work at America's first "living wage building," where all city contractors must pay their workers $6.60 per hour and $7.70 in 1998.

"Praise God," Lee told a crowd of 200 as Maryland Gov. Parris Glendening handed out the custodians' first living wage paychecks. The July 25 ceremony dedicated the World Trade Center as a living wage building.

Waging war. Living wage movements such as the one in Baltimore began spreading after radical conservatives in Congress fought an increase in the national minimum wage. Though AFSCME and other unions finally forced Congress to raise the national minimum to $5.15 an hour by September 1, 1997, that amount is still not enough to bring low-paid workers above the poverty level.

With AFSCME's backing, a number of cities are in the process of enacting living wage laws-including Milwaukee, Wis., Portland, Ore., San Jose, Calif., Jersey City, N.J., and New York City. AFSCME activists are also supporting living wage campaigns in Chicago, Missouri, Minnesota, Denver, Buffalo, N.Y., Boston and Los Angeles.

AFSCME Pres. Gerald W. McEntee said that workers like Lee aren't the only ones who benefit from a living wage. "The living wage levels the playing field for many working AFSCME members whose work might otherwise be contracted out to private companies that profit by paying low wages," he said.

Pay hike. Baltimore's law was won after an 18-month organizing and bargaining campaign by the Solidarity Sponsoring Committee, which became Local 1711-created by AFSCME and BUILD (Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development). BUILD is an organization of 50 churches affiliated with the Chicago-based Industrial Areas Foundation, a nationwide network of community and religious groups.

The nation's first living wage building belongs to the state and is exempt from the city law. However Glendening mandated that the contractor comply, despite the objections of local business leaders who say that paying a living wage costs them too much money.

Thanks to the living wage, Willie Lee hopes sometime soon she'll be able to quit her second job. Meanwhile, the living wage affords Lee and her co-workers hard-earned and well-deserved decent pay.

By Venida RaMar Marshall