Essential work deserves a living wage
What if we aligned our economy with our values, and paid for the labor that helps our communities thrive?
Among the most important lessons from the disruption of the pandemic relates to how we as a society value labor. For a year, we’ve heard about “essential workers:” those involved in our food supply, the transportation of goods, and health care.
And yet in too many cases, these very workers are among the lowest paid. Put another way: we do not value essential labor as much as we would like to believe. The current battle over increasing the federal minimum wage shows that starkly.
No one can legitimately argue that $15 an hour is anything but a barely adequate living wage. In many parts of the country, it will not be enough to provide housing, food, transportation, and childcare. The argument is whether the federal government has a role in ensuring this barely adequate wage is paid to all who work.
The work of caretaking: teaching and caring for children, housekeeping, food preparation - often very low paid, or expected without compensation from (primarily) women in households. The work of food production: agriculture workers, packing plants, small farmers - often very low paid and highly uncertain. The back-breaking labor in distribution of goods and collection of garbage: often low paid and low-status. And the work of caring for mother Earth, ensuring clean air and water? In many cases, shunned altogether as “dirty,” or punished as illegal. And at the same time, the same ideologies that construct a working poor economy - in which people with full-time jobs cannot provide for their families’ full needs - claim to uphold the dignity of work, and contrast it with government funded financial assistance as a kind of patronizing, dehumanizing “handout.”
It is not this way around the world. As an example, the work of parenting is supported financially in many advanced democracies (see source after the photo). It’s a reminder that our economy is constructed out of our decisions, based on our priorities.
As we fight to address the terror of working poverty I’m wondering about a more radical transformation of our economy: What if we paid the most for the labor that matters most? What if we invested our consumer dollars in the highest quality food, grown close to home, with practices that nurture and protect the planet and provide for the laborers? What if we invested our tax dollars in humane, easily accessible health care for all? What if we ensured that teachers earned enough to focus on their skills and passion for helping other learn? What if those who deal with society’s waste earned top dollar, funded by the corporations that create the waste?
What if, in other words, we aligned our economy with our values: rewarding the labor that brings about safe, inclusive, thriving families and communities? Establishing an adequate minimum wage is a start. A Green New Deal holds promise for aligning our infrastructure, and its economic impact, with our values. There is more that needs to be done, and as always, now is the best time to start.
For those of you reading this who engage in these important labors: parenting, child and elder care, teaching, food production and distribution, water, air, and earth protection - thank you. We will always work hard to show how we value your contributions.
Be safe and well, and thank you so much for joining me on this journey.
Listen to this Fresh Air interview with journalist Clair Cain Miller, on working moms in the U.S. during the pandemic, to hear her summary of how many other countries support working parents.
https://www.npr.org/2021/02/18/968930085/almost-a-year-into-the-pandemic-working-moms-feel-forgotten-journalist-says