From the Dispatch

Wage Theft by Employers Surging in Wake of Arizona’s Anti-Immigrant Law, Even as Judge Blocks Implementation of Key Provisions

Suman Raghunathan — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 11:44:07 -0400

The Arizona Interfaith Alliance for Worker Justice, a worker center in Phoenix, has seen a “huge spike” in wage theft -- violations of minimum wage laws -- since the passage of SB 1070, Arizona’s anti-immigrant law. "Employers are even more brazen in their mistreatment of workers," said Executive Director Trina Zelle in an interview with In These Times. "Increasingly, 'Go ahead, try and make me pay you' is the response workers hear when they confront their employers over unpaid wages."

Workers' rights organizers report that the law's passage in April has already begun to drive immigrant workers even further underground, effectively silencing them in the face of rampant workplace rights violations. The irony is that this makes undocumented immigrants an even more attractive workforce for unscrupulous employers, who know they can illegally underpay them without fear of those employees reporting them or taking them to court. “If we ever hope to bring immigrant workers out of the shadows in which they’ve been laboring,” says Kim Bobo, Executive Director of Interfaith Worker Justice, “we need to forcefully oppose anti-immigrant legislation and stand up for both comprehensive immigration reform and vigorous enforcement of the nation’s labor laws.”

Progressive States Network's model legislation for wage law enforcement outlines how wage enforcement campaigns can counter anti-immigrant rhetoric by raising wage standards for all workers and uniting native and immigrant communities to oppose unscrupulous employers.

Judge Strikes Down Worst Provisions of SB 1070: Yesterday, a federal judge struck down key provisions of SB 1070 as likely violating federal law or being unconstitutional, reinvigorating hope among immigrant communities that state anti-immigrant laws will fail to gain traction. Key provisions that were blocked include:

Requiring police officers to investigate the immigration status of individuals they stop who they suspect are undocumented;
Mandatory detention of individuals who are arrested if they cannot verify they are authorized to be in the U.S.;
Imposing state criminal penalties on non-citizens who fail to register with the Department of Homeland Security or failing to carry registration documents;
Warrantless arrests of individuals who are deemed by state or local police officers to be "removable" from the U.S.; and,
State statutes that make it a crime for alleged undocumented immigrants to work.

The initial court injunction will be followed by a full hearing to determine whether these provisions, as well as the law's other troubling components, will be permanently struck down. The ruling echoes numerous other legal decisions that struck down broad state anti-immigrant laws - and should serve as a warning to other states that enacting copycat legislation similar to Arizona's will lead to costly legal proceedings and, as discussed above, only serve to empower unscrupulous employers to violate wage laws.

Resources:
Working In These Times - ‘Go Ahead, Try and Make Me Pay You’: Wage Theft and SB 1070
Progressive States Network - Promoting Wage Law Enforcement Policies in 2010
Interfaith Worker Justice - Thou Shalt Not Steal - A Toolkit on Wage Theft
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) - Court Blocks Implementation of Key Sections of Arizona's Racial Profiling Law
National Employment Law Project (NELP) - Enforcement of Workplace Standards

Wal-Mart Deal for Higher Wages in Chicago Highlights Need for Industry-Specific Wage Legislation

Tim Judson — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 11:42:31 -0400

For the first time in the nation, Wal-Mart has agreed to a higher wage standard at a new store to be built in Chicago, Illinois. The retail giant’s commitment was part of an agreement to assure City Council support for zoning approvals, on which the Council voted Wednesday. The deal also concludes a six-year fight over what will be only Wal-Mart’s second store in the Windy City. As we reported previously, Wal-Mart reached a stalemate with labor unions in 2006, after the City Council passed an industry-specific wage standard for big box retailers, which was later vetoed by Mayor Richard M. Daley.

Under the new agreement, Wal-Mart commits to a starting wage of $8.75, $0.50 per hour higher than the minimum wage for new employees. After one year of employment, Wal-Mart will raise workers’ wages by $0.60 to $9.35 per hour. Wal-Mart also agreed to pay prevailing wage, use union contractors to build the store and to provide $20 million to local non-profits over five years. The company claims the deal paves the way for it to move forward with plans to open two-dozen more stores in Chicago by 2015, although the agreement does not cover any other stores.

Legislation Needed to Lock-in Higher Wage Standards: Despite conventional assumptions about the economy, the Wal-Mart case shows that state and local governments still have good opportunities to raise wage and labor standards, particularly on an industry-specific basis. Still, this is a an agreement for only one store, rather than the city-wide policy embodied in the original ordinance approved by the City Council. Wal-Mart was able to negotiate its compromise by fragmenting the opposition with promises of temporary benefits to the building trades and non-profits and avoiding broader legislation. If Chicago enacted its 2006 wage ordinance, the local economy would have benefited from thousands of workers throughout the city’s big-box retail sector being lifted out of poverty and depending less on public services.

While the deal represents a first for Wal-Mart, it falls short of other actions cities and states are taking to set higher industry-specific wage and labor standards. For instance, in 2008 Los Angeles passed a law that sets a living wage standard at all hotels near the LAX airport; and in 2009, New York state passed a law requiring labor peace agreements for all hotels developed or financed by the state through its public benefit corporations. New York is also considering a bill that would set a prevailing wage standard for building service workers employed by public utilities.

A similar fight is looming over Wal-Mart’s plans to build its first store in New York City, where the City Council in December stood strong by rejecting another retail project because the developer would not agree to a living wage standard. According to City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, the question for elected officials is not about creating jobs or not creating jobs, but about what kind of jobs the city should be creating: “We don't want companies that have led the nation in law suits being brought against them by workers,” she said. “We don't want companies that have the largest class-action in history brought against them. We don't want companies where women are, over and over, paid less than men and not promoted.”

Resources
National Employment Law Project - The Road to Responsible Contracting
Good Jobs First - High Road or Low Road? Job Quality in the New Green Economy
Good Jobs First - Making the Connection: Transit-Oriented Jobs and Development
Economic Policy Institute - The Employment Impact of a Comprehensive Living Wage Law, Evidence from California

Workplace Standards for Domestic Workers: Breakthrough NY Legislation Approved

Tim Judson — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 16:59:00 -0400

On June 1, the New York Senate put the state in position to be first in the nation to enact a Domestic Workers' Rights law (S2311) by a vote of 33-28. The New York Assembly led the way in June 2009 when it passed its own version of the bill (A1470). This groundbreaking legislation will extend core labor rights, from fair labor standards to paid sick days, to creating a framework for collective bargaining, to domestic workers. This will include those employed to work in a private home to perform housekeeping and/or to care for children, the infirm, or the elderly.

The two versions of the law must be reconciled, as the Senate bill goes much farther in extending basic labor standards, but Gov. David Paterson pledged last year that he would sign the bill. A campaign to pass similar domestic workers legislation is also active in California.

Justice Seventy Years Delayed: Seventy years after passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), domestic workers like agricultural workers are still denied many basic labor protections under federal law such as overtime pay and the ability to join a union. That omission was an extension of the country's entrenched history of discrimination, particularly in the pre-Civil Rights Act era: both farm and domestic workforces had long been dominated by African Americans.

In the 21^st Century, domestic workers remain one of the most exploited segments of the workforce, being comprised almost entirely of immigrant women: according to Domestic Workers' United, 99% are foreign born, 95% are people of color, and 93% are women. Until 1974, when the FLSA was amended to extend minimum wage coverage to them, domestic workers were not protected by any major federal labor law.

As California showed by passing the Agricultural Labor Relations Act in 1975, states can play a leading role in providing basic labor standards for workers abandoned by federal labor law. Just as the United Farm Workers elevated the plight of farmworkers to national attention beginning in the 1960s - and which resulted in passage of the California law - groups such as Domestic Workers United and the National Domestic Workers Alliance have just begun in the last decade to bring similar attention to promoting state and federal reforms on behalf of domestic workers.

Precedent-Setting Standards: Because of the challenging employer-employee relationship involved in domestic employment, the Senate law seeks to create a standard contract for all domestic workers specifying benefits that they are owed. The New York Assembly version has more limited but important benefits - guaranteeing a minimum wage law, prohibiting mandatory overtime, overtime pay, guaranteeing one day of rest per week, and directing the state's Labor Department to investigate a framework for providing employer-provided healthcare and collective bargaining - while the Senate version also provides for:

Paid time off, including six paid holidays, five vacation days, and seven paid sick days (with provision for holiday pay and increased overtime rate on holidays)
Two-weeks, written notice of termination, with violations subject to back-pay
Criminal penalties for violations, including misdemeanor penalties of up to $20,000 and one year in prison for first violations, and similar felony penalties for subsequent offenses
Enforcement either through civil action or prosecution by the Labor Department or Attorney General, with willful violations subject to fines equal to 25% of unpaid wages

A National Breakthrough on Paid Sick Days: Should the paid time off provisions of the Senate bill be included in the final version of the law, New York will be the first state in the country to establish paid time off as a basic labor standard, not just for domestic workers, but for any private-sector employees -- advancing basic labor standards that are common throughout the rest of the world but sorely lacking in the United States. The new law is especially significant for the movement to enact paid sick leave legislation, since it would also be the first time an entire industrial sector has acquired the right to take paid sick time off from work. The Domestic Workers' Rights bill has not met with organized opposition thus far, primarily because of the informal nature of domestic employment.

Federal Health Reform Benefits for Early Retirees Begins on June 1st

Enzo Pastore — Thu, 27 May 2010 11:24:21 -0400

One of the immediate benefits of the Affordable Care Act is the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program. Beginning June 1, 2010, this new reinsurance reimbursement program is available to group health plan sponsors who provide medical coverage to early retirees and their spouses, surviving spouses and dependents.

Program Goal: Many Americans who retire without employer-sponsored insurance and before they become Medicare eligible are faced with the possibility of seeing their retirement savings disappear because of unaffordable, exorbitant rates in the individual insurance market. The goal of this temporary program is to provide financial assistance to employers to help them maintain the coverage they offer for their early retirees. Early retirees are individuals age 55 and older who are not yet eligible for Medicare and who are enrolled in health benefits under the employer-sponsored plan.

Employers will be reimbursed for the cost of providing certain health benefits, including medical, surgical, hospital, and prescription drug benefits. This will encourage employers to continue to provide health coverage to early retirees until the state health exchanges and federal subsidies for health coverage are implemented in January 1, 2014.

State Governments Are Eligible: Entities who are eligible to participate in the reinsurance program can be private employers, state or local governments, employee organizations, voluntary beneficiary associations or a multi-employer plan that already offers health benefits to their retirees. Both self-funded and insured plans are permitted to apply.

To receive assistance, plans must have their applications approved and certified by HHS. A number of requirements must be met in order to participate in the reinsurance program. One such requirement is that the plan sponsor must have in place programs and procedures that have or have the potential to generate cost savings for participants with chronic and high-cost conditions. Chronic and high cost conditions are defined as a condition for which $15,000 or more in applicable claims are likely to be incurred during a plan year by one participant.

Reimbursement: Plan sponsors must first submit an application to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in order to become certified to participate in the reimbursement program. Once a sponsor is certified to participate in the program, the claims submitted for reimbursement must be between $15,000 and $90,000 per year (determined on a per-participant basis). The partial reimbursements are limited to 80 percent of the costs attributable to claims that exceed $15,000.

Maintenance of Effort: While employers can use the savings to either reduce their own health care costs, provide premium relief to their workers and families or a combination of both, one important caveat of the program is a maintenance of effort requirement. This means participating sponsors must agree to maintain funding levels to support their applicable plan or plans. The federal statute requires that funds dispersed under the reinsurance program cannot be used as general revenue. The sponsors will need to indicate how the funds they receive will be applied to maintain their level of effort in supporting the plan.

With a total allocation of $5 billion, the program will end January 1, 2014, when early retirees become eligible to choose their insurance coverage through state health insurance exchanges.

Resources:
The White House - Fact Sheet: Early Benefits from the Affordable Care Act of 2010: Reinsurance Program for Early Retirees
HealthReform.gov - Fact Sheet: The Affordable Care Act’s Early Retiree Reinsurance Program
Federal Register, Vol. 75, No. 86: 45 - Interim Final Rule for Early Retiree Reinsurance Program (May 5, 2010)
NCSL Fact Sheets on Health Reform - Early Retiree Reinsurance Program
HealthCare POV blog - Health Care Reform - Early Retiree Reinsurance Program
McDermott, Will and Emery Newsletter - Health Care Reform - Early Retiree Reinsurance Program

Wage Law Enforcement State Trend: Illinois Becomes Most Recent State to Crack Down on Wage Theft

Tim Judson — Mon, 17 May 2010 12:48:32 -0400

A crime wave has been sweeping Illinois, with surveys of low-wage workers in the Chicago area showing an average of 146,300 cases of wage theft each week -- resulting in about $7.3 million each week in unpaid wages, or $380 million stolen from workers each year. In order to crack down on this criminal wage theft, the Illinois General Assembly on May 3 nearly unanimously (56-0 in the Senate and 112-1 in the House) passed SB 3568, which will strengthen the state’s ability to enforce violations of the Wage Payment and Collection Act, including these new or enhanced provisions:

Criminal Penalties: Both first offenses and repeat offenses will now be considered more serious crimes, with repeat offenders facing up to three years in prison.
Private Right of Action: Employees are permitted to press their case in court and to recover attorney fees and other court costs. The law specifies that workers do not need to wait for a complaint filed with the Department of Labor is processed, but they can take their case directly to the state circuit court. This will relieve the state of some of the enforcement burden and allow workers to obtain relief more quickly.
Class Action Suits: SB 3568 for the first time expressly permits employees to file class action lawsuits.
Anti-Retaliation: Employees are protected from retaliation for reporting alleged violations in public forums, such as to a community organization or at a public hearing. It also gives employees who have been subject to retaliation the right to file claims against their employers, either through the Department of Labor or in civil actions; and
Speedier Resolution of Claims: Enables the Illinois Department of Labor to establish a process for adjudicating smaller violation claims more expeditiously.

The Legislature's action came in response to University of Illinois research highlighting that low-wage workers were losing an average of 16% of their earnings each year to employer malfeasance.

Wave of Wage Law Enforcement Around the Country: Illinois' legislative action follows a growing number of states and counties enacting wage enforcement laws to address the crime of wage theft by employers. In 2009, New Mexico, Delaware, Maryland and Iowa enacted wage enforcement laws, as did Washington in March of this year. A wage law enforcement bill, S 07050, is now before the New York State Senate this session. Municipalities are also taking up the issue, with Miami-Dade County passing a county-level wage enforcement law in February. The City of San Francisco also passed a strong enforcement statute as part of its minimum wage law a few years ago, and bills are expected to be introduced in the cities of Los Angeles and New Orleans.

Some states have begun to address the issue through adapting their existing enforcement programs. In the past few years, for instance, New York and California formed multi-agency task forces to compile information and target industries where violations are known to be rampant. However, leaders in those states have usually found it necessary to strengthen the existing laws through creating stiffer penalties, expanding enforcement measures, and making the system more responsive to victims of wage theft.

The Cost to Communities from Wage Theft: Legislators are responding to research highlighting the severe toll wage theft is taking not just on workers, but on local economies and state and municipal tax rolls. Because low-wage earners spend a greater percentage of their income on local goods and services, wage theft on such a large scale does not merely affect workers and their families -- it has a major community-wide impact. Research in Chicago mirrors results from other cities studied by the University of Illinois and the National Employment Law Project. Even a business-community think tank, the Economic Policy Foundation, admits that wage theft is widespread: it estimated $19 billion per year in unpaid overtime alone, not to mention other wage and hour violations.

The rise in wage and hour violations is particularly prevalent among businesses with a high percentage of low-wage employees and/or immigrant workers. Lack of enforcement contributes both to downward pressure on wages and income levels and creates an incentive for employers to recruit undocumented workers, who are even less likely to know their rights and to press charges against their employers. For this reason, forward-thinking legislators are also promoting wage enforcement as a positive measure states can take in support of comprehensive immigration reform and as an alternative to regressive, anti-immigrant measures such as Arizona’s SB 1070. See Progressive States Network's Promoting Wage Law Enforcement Policies in 2010 for more on key provisions, model legislation and resources to support state wage enforcement campaigns.

Resources:
Progressive States Network - Promoting Wage Law Enforcement Policies in 2010
Center for Urban Economic Development, University of Illinois at Chicago - Unregulated Work in Chicago: The Breakdown of Workplace Protections in the Low-Wage Labor Market
National Employment Law Project - Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers: Violations of Employment and Labor Laws in America's Cities
Interfaith Worker Justice - Thou Shalt Not Steal: A Toolkit on Wage Theft
Talking Points Memo - Sunlight and Enforcement Are the Best Disinfectants (Against Wage Theft)
Kim Bobo, Interfaith Worker Justice - Wage Theft in America: Why Millions of Working Americans Are Not Getting Paid - And What We Can Do About It (The New Press, 2009)

Public Employees Earn Substantially Less than Private Sector Counterparts

Altaf Rahamatulla — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 12:24:45 -0400

Refuting right-wing attacks on state workers, a new report by the National Institute for Retirement Security (NIRS) and the Council on State and Local Government Excellence (CSGE), Out of Balance? Comparing Public and Private Sector Compensation Over 20 Years, demonstrates that state and local employees earn an average of 11 and 12 percent less, respectively, than comparable private sector workers.

In the past year, 42 states have either slashed public employee wages, required furloughs, imposed hiring freezes, or cut state workforce positions. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) reports that since August 2008, state and local governments have eliminated approximately 192,000 jobs. These types of actions not only diminish the quality of public service provision, but additionally hurt working families.

With the economic downturn fostering a renewed interest in public employee compensation and privatization schemes, this report serves as a critical resource to push back against some of the misguided claims that target state workers' wages as a primary cause of budget shortfalls. Some of the most significant findings include:

On average, public sector jobs demand higher education levels compared to the private sector. State and local government workers are twice as likely to have a college or advanced degree.
Although pensions make up a larger share of public employees overall compensation, state and local workers' total compensation is 6.8 and 7.4 percent lower than comparable private sector workers.
The public-private wage gap has only widened in the last 20 years. As the graph below illustrates, state public employees of comparable skill levels were almost reaching wage parity with private sector counterparts in the late 1980s, but their relative pay fell sharply during the 1990s.

The report also analyzes states with large populations -- California, Texas, New York, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Florida -- and finds that this general wage dynamic exists across the country. As the authors point out, "[t]his recession calls for equal sacrifice, but long-term patterns indicate that the average compensation of state and local employees is not excessive. Indeed, if the goal is to compensate public and private workforces in a comparable manner, then the data do not call for reductions in average state and local wages and benefits."

Resources:
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities - An Update on State Budget Cuts
National Institute for Retirement Security and the Council on State and Local Government Excellence - Out of Balance? Comparing Public and Private Sector Compensation Over 20 Years

Workplace Tragedies Point to Need for States to Take Lead in Workplace Safety

Tim Judson — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 12:20:18 -0400

April has seen two major industrial accidents that have captured the national eye. Explosions at the Upper Big Branch Mine in West Virginia and the Deepwater Horizon oil rig off the coast of Louisiana claimed the lives of forty workers and injured thirty-eight. Much of the media attention on these tragedies has focused on the culpability of employers and enforcement capacity at federal agencies responsible for regulating mine and offshore drilling safety. However, there are proactive steps states can take to address occupational safety hazards and ensure people do not have to sacrifice their personal safety in exchange for a paycheck.

The Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) not only established a federal enforcement system, it also created a matching-funds program for states to operate their own safety enforcement programs. OSHA will provide a 50-50 match to help states cover the cost of enforcement programs that meet or exceed the federal agency standards. State participation in the program is crucial to enhancing enforcement capacity nationwide. For instance, OSHA does not cover state and local government workplaces, so there are currently an estimated 8 million public sector workers without occupational safety oversight. To date, twenty-one states have established qualifying programs, while four more states (Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, and New York) have enforcement programs limited to covering public sector employees.

The AFL-CIO released a report this week documenting the serious lack of federal safety enforcement capacity. The report analyzes recently published data by the Bureau of Labor Statistics which shows higher than normal casualty rates among immigrant and Latino workers, as well as construction workers. Nationally, the US has only 16% of the total number of inspectors recommended by the United Nations' International Labor Office (ILO). (The ILO sets a standard of one inspector per 10,000 workers. The US had only one inspector per 60,723 workers as of 2008.) Given this deficit, states have a powerful opportunity to bridge this gap by bolstering workplace safety enforcement that prevents work-site tragedies like those seen this month.

Under the Obama administration, the federal government is taking steps to improve occupational safety, but requires state cooperation to establish the necessary enforcement capacity. To this end, Congress introduced two pieces of legislation this year. The Protecting America’s Workers Act strengthens federal safety standards, while the Ensuring Worker Safety Act would enable a more cooperative relationship between OSHA and state safety agencies. The availability of federal matching dollars makes it possible for states to improve workplace safety at a manageable cost, when combined with innovative enforcement mechanisms that generate revenue for the state at low cost. For instance, private attorneys general provisions being included in wage enforcement and misclassification bills increase enforcement capacity by enabling workers to file claims using their own lawyers, with the state receiving a portion of the fines levied by the court against guilty employers. A similar provision in state occupational safety programs would assist states in ramping up enforcement capacity while limiting budgetary exposure. As with paid sick days, occupational safety programs can be an innovative, cost-effective step states can take to ensure that working and middle class families do not lose basic workplace standards as the economy improves.

Resources:
AFL-CIO - Death on the Job Report, 2010
AFL-CIO - Protecting America’s Workers Act
International Labor Organization – Programme on Safety and Health at Work and in the Environment
Nevada Rep. Dina Titus - Testimony on OSHA Legislation Before Nevada Legislative Commission Subcommittee
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) - State Occupational Safety and Health Plans
OSHA - Sec. 18 of the Occupational Safety and Health Act – State Jurisdiction and State Plans
OSHA - How does a State establish its own program?
OSHA - Directory of States With Approved Occupational Safety and Health Plans
Occupational Safety and Health State Plan Association (OSHSPA)The Nation - Hilda Solis: Labor's New Sheriff

Arizona Risks Jeopardizing its Economic Future as it Contemplates Passing Anti-Immigrant Law

Suman Raghunathan — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 12:37:04 -0400

This week, the Arizona Senate passed the nation's most draconian immigration law - which criminalizes the undocumented and those accused of assisting them - that many critics say will drive racial profiling and further undermine Arizona's devastated economy. The bill now awaits now awaits Governor Jan Brewer's veto or approval. Advanced by anti-immigrant leader State Sen. Russell Pearce, SB 1070 would:

make it a state crime to be undocumented and to seek work, including on street corners, in Arizona;
allow state police and other law enforcement officers to arrest anyone without a warrant based upon "reasonable suspicion" that they are undocumented and notify federal immigration agents;
make it a crime to impede traffic while attempting to hire a day laborer in the street;
bar state, city, and county officials from limiting enforcement of federal immigration laws, and allow anyone in the state to sue an official or law enforcement agency they believe is not enforcing the state's anti-immigrant law (with a provision to deter some frivolous lawsuits); and
impose a financial penalty on anyone who harbors or transports an undocumented immigrant - including family members.

Arizona is the first state in the nation to seek to criminalize all of its undocumented residents who have not committed any crime other than lacking immigration status.

Arizona Leaders Denounce Bill: Leaders from Arizona's faith-based communities and organizations, business leaders and law enforcement officers have also spoken out against the bill, noting it will: hurt both employers and their employees statewide; erode community-policing practices by generating widespread fear in immigrant communities of all law enforcement officers; and discourage immigrant residents from reporting crimes or serving as witnesses for fear of being deported. Immigrant and civil rights activists warn that the bill provides a free pass for state and local police officers to engage in racial profiling by stopping anyone who appears Latino or to be an immigrant; members of a national organization of police officers just announced their opposition to the bill and urged other states not to follow Arizona's lead.

The public response to the bill has been overwhelming: according to Governor Brewer's office, as of Monday they received 11,931 calls, faxes, and e-mails in opposition to the bill and only 1,356 calls, faxes and e-mails expressing support. Immigrant rights activists, led by Maricopa County Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox, delivered another 50,000 petitions to Brewer's office Tuesday expressing opposition to the bill. Brewer has yet to signal her decision, giving hope to some activists. She has until Saturday, April 25 to sign the bill, or can ultimately allow the bill to become law without her signature - if she does not veto it. Brewer faces a tough election race this year, and many believe her indecision on the bill hinges on political calculations related to state voters' attitudes toward immigrants and immigration.

The Economic Costs of Anti-Immigrant Policies: Arizona has been pursuing an increasingly anti-immigrant approach over the last few years, yet it faces the highest loss of employment in the nation and some of the highest foreclosure rates. Many estimate the bill will just make matters worse with immigrant families and businesses fleeing Arizona in response, further devastating the state's economy by costing the state up to $26.4 billion in economic activity. This is likely to further weaken the state's troubled housing market; and business leaders warn that losing those residents will decrease much-needed sales and property tax revenues.

The Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF) and the ACLU are expected to challenge the bill in court, noting it will encourage racial profiling against the state's Latino and immigrant residents. Business leaders warn that costly legal challenges to the bill will not help reduce the state's current $3 billion budget deficit and will result in billions of dollars in lost revenue.

Confronting Anti-Immigrant Demagoguery: Senator Pearce, a former state trooper who has introduced enforcement-only immigration legislation for nearly a decade in Arizona, has made anti-immigrant politics a personal crusade, has also been linked to neo-Nazi groups. Pearce was previously vilified by some Republican and Democratic colleagues for his extreme and often-vitriolic stances on immigration, and he introduced a bill similar to SB 1070 during former Governor Janet Napolitano's tenure, which she vetoed. Napolitano is now Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, and is responsible for developing national immigration policy.

Leaders across the country are stepping up to confront these anti-immigrant attacks. State legislators from over twenty states have worked with Progressive States Network to form State Legislators for Progressive Immigration Policy (SLPIP) to directly challenge these attacks in the states. Arizona Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, a PSN Board Member and State Legislators for Progressive Immigration Policy (SLPIP) leader, confronted bill supporter Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio on CNN yesterday over the issue. Watch the debate online by clicking on the image below.

Arizona has a unique political dynamic and demographics that may be leading it down this destructive road, one reminiscent of California's anti-immigrant legislation of the 1990s. Arizona, ground zero for unauthorized border crossings from Mexico into the US, has seen its undocumented population surge by over 40% in the past decade, largely fueled by the state's housing boom and a growing number of service sector jobs assisting its aging baby boomer residents. Yet the state's demographics do not mirror its electorate: Latinos account for 30% of the state's population, yet are only 11.7% of the electorate, according to Census data.

A More Effective Alternative: Despite Arizona's punitive approach toward immigration, many other states are pursuing far more sensible policies to integrate immigrants into local communities and economies. We detailed many of these effective approaches being pursued around the country in our Dispatch piece, State Immigration Policy to Promote National Change in January. Most states won't want to follow the misguided and potentially economically disastrous example set by SB 1070.

More on the Economic Effects of the Bill: Immigrants and Latinos are critical to Arizona's economy. According to a University of Arizona study, the state's immigrant workers generated $44 billion in economic output in 2004 and sustained roughly 400,000 full-time jobs. The state's more than 35,000 Latino-owned businesses generated $4.3 billion in economic activity and were responsible for over 39,000 state jobs in 2002, the last year for which such data is available.

Business leaders warn enacting SB 1070 will result in immigrants (including those with legal status or US citizenship who have undocumented family members) leaving the state - thereby decreasing sales and property tax revenues statewide.The Perryman Group estimates that if all undocumented residents were removed from Arizona, the state would lose:

$26.4 billion in economic activity;
$11.7 billion in gross state product; and
approximately 140,324 jobs.

Arizona's Politics: Many of the state's non-citizen Latinos are immigrants who arrived in the state over the past decade and have yet to make their way through the citizenship process and become voters. Political scientists and academics note many of the state's white voters have a "libertarian, Old West mentality" and tend to vote conservatively, supporting Phoenix's anti-immigrant Sheriff Joe Arpaio -- who is currently being investigated by the US Department of Justice for his decision to use sheriff's deputies to enforce immigration laws.

Several analyses of the federal 287(g) program, which advocates note also encourages racial profiling, have found the program is often costly and ineffective. Most undocumented residents apprehended through the program in North Carolina, for example, were only guilty of misdemeanors such as traffic violations - at a cost of $5.5 million annually to the state's Mecklenburg County. County Supervisors in Virginia's Prince William County decided to not implement the portion of their local immigration legislation that deputized local police officers to enforce immigration laws after they realized the price tag for the initiative would amount to at least $14 million over five years.

Meanwhile, demographers note the number of undocumented residents in the nation as a whole has decreased by roughly 1 million in the past two years due to the economic downturn, which has hit the construction, restaurant, and service industries particularly hard - all employment sources for many undocumented immigrants. Other states that have seen a significant increase among their undocumented residents include Georgia, Texas, Nevada, Illinois, and North Carolina.

Resources:
Immigration Policy Center - How Much Will Arizona's Immigration Bill (SB 1070) Cost?
Border Action Network - Russell Pearce's SB 1070: Why It's Bad for Arizona and How YOU Can Fight It
Immigration Policy Center - New Americans in the Grand Canyon State
Progressive States Network - The Anti-Immigrant Movement that Failed: Positive Integration Policies by States Still Far Outweigh Punitive Policies
Progressive States Network - Secret Deportation Quotas, Program Failures, and High Budget Costs from Local Immigration Enforcement Revealed in Recent Reports
Progressive States Network - State Immigration Policy to Promote National Change

Washington State Latest to Sign Bill Against Wage Theft

Suman Raghunathan — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 12:47:12 -0400

Washington state Governor Christine Gregoire signed a bill to combat wage theft this week, adding Washington to a growing number of states and counties, including Miami-Dade County, cracking down on employers who underpay workers (many of them undocumented immigrants) and violate minimum wage and overtime rules. Progressive States Network highlighted many of the key provisions, model legislation and resources available for wage theft and enforcement policies back in December.

Many workers' rights advocates cite wage theft as the number one complaint heard from workers in recent months - a trend echoed by researchers In fact recent studies have found wage theft is endemic among low-wage workers: according to a 2009 National Employment Law Project study, an overwhelming 68 percent of low-wage workers surveyed throughout the nation reported wage theft in 2008, regardless of their citizenship status.

Washington's law provides the State's Department of Labor and Industries with new tools to combat wage theft, including imposing penalties on businesses that repeatedly violate wage laws and allows the Department to require wage bonds of businesses that habitually fail to pay wages owed to their workers. Wage theft continues to multiply, preventing many workers from making a fair wage and often preventing state and local governments form collecting thousands of dollars in state and local income and employer taxes. On top of other bills introduced earlier in the session in other states, wage theft bills were introduced in Illinois (SB 3568) and New York state (S 07050) just in the last ten days.

Resources:
National Employment Law Project - Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers: Violations of Employment and Labor Laws in America's Cities
Interfaith Worker Justice - Thou Shalt Not Steal: A Toolkit on Wage Theft
Progressive States Network - Promoting Wage Law Enforcement Policies in 2010
Talking Points Memo - Sunlight and Enforcement Are the Best Disinfectants (Against Wage Theft)
Kim Bobo, Interfaith Worker Justice -Wage Theft in America: Why Millions of Working Americans Are Not Getting Paid - And What We Can Do About It (The New Press, 2009)

Labor Peace Law in New York Part of Trend of Promoting Labor Rights on Government Projects

Nathan Newman — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:01:00 -0500

On March 1st, a new law in New York goes into effect, strengthening the freedom of employees to form labor unions at hotels or convention centers run or funded by state authorities, a dramatic victory for hotel workers in the state. The law has specific language requiring that hotels or convention centers where state public authorities have a substantial proprietary interest include a "labor peace agreement" with hotel unions in the state in exchange for the unions agreeing not to strike for five years. The law follows a similar executive order by the Governor approved last year.

Such "labor peace agreements" laws, also often called Project Labor Agreements (PLAs), have become increasingly common in recent years, sometimes negotiated by state and local governments on a project-by-project basis but also required for particular categories of projects. A major expansion of the Los Angeles International Airport includes a PLA that requires neutrality by employers and recognition of unions when a majority of workers sign cards asking for recognition. Hartford and the District of Columbia, for example, also have general labor peace ordinances.

At the federal level, President Obama's Executive Order 13502: Use of Project Labor Agreements for Federal Construction Projects encourages -- although does not require -- federal agencies to use PLAs on federal construction projects in excess of $25 million.

The advantages of such labor peace agreements are clear. As this report by the Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations notes, it makes costs predictable and prevents delays and disruptions, while preventing the "'under the table' cash payments, ignoring wage, hour and tax laws, and intentional misclassification of workers as independent contractors" that has become too common industry practices.

Resources:
Text of Labor Peace Portion of 2009 New York Public Authorities Law
American Prospect - Good Jobs, Healthy Cities
Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations - Project Labor Agreements in New York: In the Public Interest
Office of New York Governor - Labor Peace Policy Directive
Labor Peace Now - The Hartford Labor Peace Ordinance
District of Columbia Hotel Development Projects Labor Peace Agreement Act
White House - Executive Order 13502: Use of Project Labor Agreements for Federal Construction Projects