Government Sweatshops: A Time for the President to Act

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This week in Washington, hundreds of low wage federal government contract workers walked off their jobs, demonstrating for a living wage and a union. They included Senate janitors and food service workers -- the workers who serve the senators their food and clean up the messes they leave.

Carrying a sign reading "Hiring: A President who will sign a $15 +Union Executive Order," these workers are calling on President Obama to lead and put government on the side of workers. They want an executive order that would give preference in government procurement and licensing to companies that pay a living wage with benefits, and respect their workers' right to organize. Joining their cause were Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt), now weighing a presidential run, as well as Congressional Progressive Caucus Co-Chairs Reps Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) and Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), and many other legislators.

The U.S. Government: Sweatshop Employer

The sad reality is that the United States government remains the country's largest low-wage job creator. All those senators tramping through New Hampshire promising to rebuild the middle class are part of a Congress that doesn't pay the workers who serve them enough to lift a family out of poverty.

Kellie Duckett, a 30-year-old food service worker at the Capitol Visitor's Center, was one of the protestors. Paid about $11 an hour, she is forced to live with a parent, rely on Medicaid and food stamps, while still struggling to afford school uniforms and supplies for her two children. Most of the people striking, she said, "have children that they have to think about."

"We need [$15 and a union] because everything is going up: groceries, taxes, everything. But our paychecks are staying the same."

Federal contracting with private vendors supports about two million low-wage private sector jobs, according to Demos, a national research institute, in their study, "Underwriting Bad Jobs." That's is "more than the number of low wage workers at Wal-Mart and McDonald's combined."

Hundreds of billions of dollars in federal contracts, grants, loans, concession agreements and property leases go to private companies that pay lousy wages, provide few benefits, and offer employees no chance to work their way into the middle class. In some cases, such as the garment industry, Washington contractors undermine industry standards, paying "far less than the industry median," while suffering "forced overtime and hazardous work conditions."

Politicians are learning to talk the talk about raising wages and redressing inequality, but they walk the walk of driving wages down.

The Power of Presidential Action

In his 2015 State of the Union address, President Obama called out Congress on its failure to raise the minimum wage: "And to everyone in this Congress who still refuses to raise the minimum wage, I say this: If you truly believe you could work full-time and support a family on less than $15,000 a year, try it. If not, vote to give millions of the hardest-working people in America a raise."

Previously, responding to repeated mass demonstrations of low-wage workers, the president acted on his own, issuing executive orders last year to raise the minimum wage of workers on government contracts to $10.10 an hour and to tighten oversight of contractor's compliance with safety and labor laws.

Now those workers are calling on him to do "more than the minimum." Supported by Good Jobs Nation, a broad coalition of organizations (including the Campaign for America's Future that I direct), they are seeking an executive action that would put the government on the side of high-road employers like Costco rather than low-road employers like Wal-Mart. Good employers can be competitive because, by respecting their workers, they reap the savings of greater productivity, better employees and less turnover. By giving them preference, Washington can be part of lifting workers up, not driving them down.

President Obama's action on the minimum wage demonstrated the power of presidential initiative. After he issued his executive order, companies like The Gap, Disney and Ikea responded by lifting their minimum wages, cities from Seattle to Chicago acted, minimum wage initiatives passed in red states like Arkansas and Nebraska. Eventually, even McDonald's and Wal-Mart joined in. Tens of millions of workers will get a raise because the president chose to act.

But when it comes to doing more than the minimum, the federal government has been a laggard, not a leader. Good Jobs Nation points out reports that local governments are already moving -- "over 120 jurisdictions" have enacted policies that give preferences to public contractors that pay living wages, offer health care, provide paid leave and/or promote collective bargaining." New York City, for example, just expanded its living wage ordinance to ensure city contractors are paying at least $13.13 an hour. Mayor Bill De Blasio now plans to enlist other mayors and public executives to follow his example, as he takes his Economic Covenant with America across the country.