Published on Portside (https://portside.org)
Producing Poverty: The Public Cost of Low-Wage Production Jobs in
Manufacturing
Ken Jacobs, Zohar Perla, Ian Perry
and Dave Graham-Squire
Tuesday, May 10, 2016
UC Berkeley Labor Center
Recent research by the National Employment Law Project (NELP),
however, found that manufacturing production wages now rank in the bottom half
of all jobs in the United States. In decades past, production workers employed
in manufacturing earned wages significantly higher than the U.S. average, but
by 2013 the typical manufacturing production worker made 7.7 percent below the
median wage for all occupations. During the same time period productivity in
the U.S. manufacturing sector increased at a rate one-third higher than in the
private, non-farm economy overall. The median wage for production workers in
the manufacturing industry in 2013 was $15.66, with 25 percent of these workers
earning $11.91 or less. The NELP researchers also found that, since 1989, there
has been a significant increase in hiring of frontline production workers
through temporary staffing agencies, where the wages are often lower and the
work more precarious.
When a day’s labor no longer affords the basic necessities,
working Americans rely on public assistance programs funded by U.S. taxpayers
to close the gap. Recent research by David Autor and colleagues has documented
the impact of increased exposure to trade from low-wage countries on wages and
use of safety net programs. In this research brief we estimate the public cost
of low wages in frontline production jobs in the manufacturing industry by
detailing state and federal expenditures on safety net programs for workers in
this industry and their families. This brief is the latest in a series that
explores the pressures placed on safety net programs by low-wage industries.
For this analysis we focus on jobs held by frontline manufacturing
production workers, defined as non-supervisorial production workers who work at
least 10 hours per week for at least 27 weeks per year either directly in the
manufacturing industry, or in production occupations highly associated with
manufacturing in staffing agencies. We analyze utilization rates and costs in
the five largest means-tested public benefit programs for which data is
available: Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), the Federal
Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), food stamps (the Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program, or SNAP), and basic household income assistance (Temporary
Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF).
Key Findings
- Overall, we find that between 2009 and 2013 the federal
government and the states spent $10.2 billion per year on public safety
net programs for workers (and their families) who hold frontline
manufacturing production jobs. This includes workers directly hired by
manufacturers and those hired through staffing agencies.
- A third (34 percent) of the families of frontline
manufacturing production workers are enrolled in one or more public safety
net program. For those workers employed through staffing agencies, the
percentage of families utilizing safety net programs is 50 percent—similar
to the rate for fast-food workers and their families.
- The high utilization of public safety net programs by
frontline manufacturing production workers is primarily a result of low
wages, rather than inadequate work hours. The families of 32 percent of
all manufacturing production workers and 46 percent of those employed
through staffing agencies who worked at least 35 hours a week and 45 weeks
during the year were enrolled in one or more public safety net program.
- Eight of the ten states with the highest participation
rates in public programs that support frontline production workers’ families
are in the American south; the other two states are New York and
California.
[1]
Read the full report online: Producing Poverty: The Public Cost
of Low-Wage Production Jobs in Manufacturing [2]
This brief is the latest in a series [3] that
explores the pressures placed on safety net programs by low-wage industries.
Ken Jacobs is the Chair of the Labor Center, where he has been a
Labor Specialist since 2002. His areas of specialization include health care
coverage, the California budget, low-wage work, the retail industry and public
policy.
Dave Graham-Squire is a Research Associate, specializing in
statistics and quantitative methods, for the Center for Labor Research and
Education.
Source URL: https://portside.org/2016-05-16/producing-poverty-public-cost-low-wage-production-jobs-manufacturing
Links:
[1] http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/health-care-resources/usmap/
[2] http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/producing-poverty-the-public-cost-of-low-wage-production-jobs-in-manufacturing/
[3] http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/tag/public-cost-of-low-wage-work/
[2] http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/producing-poverty-the-public-cost-of-low-wage-production-jobs-in-manufacturing/
[3] http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/tag/public-cost-of-low-wage-work/
- See more at: https://portside.org/print/node/11553#sthash.Z2j1AFtk.dpuf
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The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
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