INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. - Momentum is building to raise the federal minimum wage, and a new analysis shows working women in Indiana and other states would benefit the most. Last week, the Raise the Wage Act (S.1150) was introduced in the U.S. Senate. It would increase the federal minimum wage to $12 per hour by 2020.

The Center for American Progress crunched the numbers, and its director of Women's Economic Policy, Sarah Jane Glynn, says they found 57 percent of those who would receive a raise are working women.

"Women are much more likely to be concentrated in low wage work than men," says Glynn. "Often times these are workers in industries that are heavily female-dominated, like the service industry, food service, retail, childcare, sectors like that."

Opponents of raising the minimum wage argue it would increase unemployment for lower-skilled workers but Glynn counters past increases have raised earnings and reduced poverty without leading to job losses.

Glynn adds, a person working full time at the current minimum wage would earn just over 15 thousand dollars a year, below the federal poverty line for a household with any number of children.

"These are adults, these are parents, these are people who are still having to rely on public benefits because they are below the poverty line even though they are working full-time," she says. "That really does highlight the fact we need to do something. This is an untenable situation."

Glynn says one-third of women workers who would be affected by the increase are mothers. Indiana's minimum wage is the same as the federal wage of $7.25 cents an hour.


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Orange County Convention Center food-service workers have authorized a strike, and the window for that action opens today.

Members of Unite Here Local 737 voted on November 21 to authorize a strike any time after their contract with the French food service provider Sodexo expired on Wednesday.

The vote in favor of the strike authorization was 235 to zero, and Local 737 President Jeremy Haicken said the issues are clear.

"Sodexo workers need a raise," said Haicken. "That's been our clear message. We need a raise in what people make on the job, and we need a raise in what people get in their retirement. We have full-time workers earning as little as $13.60 an hour and we have people who have no retirement plan."

In a statement, Sodexo says they will "continue to engage in good faith during ongoing CBA negotiations, in a sincere attempt to reach a fair and competitive set of long-term agreements in a timely manner."

Contract negotiations are scheduled to resume on December 13.

According to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology cost of living calculator, the living wage in Orlando is now more than $18 per hour.

In turn, Haicken said Unite Here is seeking a minimum wage of $18 per hour - along with improved retirement benefits.

"We're proposing a company-funded traditional pension plan," said Haicken. "Right now the workers have a 401(k). Very few people have enough cash on a weekly basis to put into a 401(k)."

In addition to Orlando, Sodexo is currently in contract negotiations with Unite Here workers at convention centers in Las Vegas, New Orleans, Sacramento and Detroit.

Citing a religious exemption, Edward Waters University - a private, historically Black school in Jacksonville - has shut down its faculty union.

The news came weeks after the university announced the inaugural leader of its A. Philip Randolph Institute, named after a prominent African American labor leader who led a successful campaign in 1925 to organize a union of Pullman workers and helped lead the 1963 March on Washington.

But Felicia Wider-Lewis, Ph.D - a former associate professor at Edward Waters - said she will have to leave the school today.

She claimed the infrastructure deteriorated over the years, and efforts to bargain with university leaders for better conditions failed.

"And I'm not trying to disparage the college in any mean way," said Wider-Lewis. "But we were fighting for our rights - basically, you know, for shared governance, for to have better wages and working conditions - all the things that everybody wants, you know."

Classes just ended this week for the fall semester at Edward Waters.

The university declined to comment for this story, but in a statement to the news organization The Tributary, it cited the National Labor Relations Board's 2020 decision not to have jurisdiction over religious schools.

The university stated it allows "EWU to be driven by its faith-based Christian mission, rather than the political agendas often associated with federal labor policies."

Wider-Lewis said the faculty union has been operating under the American Association of University Professors.

Lengthy negotiations came to a sudden halt in May when the university sent a letter saying it will not recognize the union - and since then, it has not.

"You know, the political arena right now, and previous in the Trump administration," said Wider-Lewis, "more of the politics was that anti-union stance."

Last year, the board of trustees of St. Leo University in Florida voted to no longer recognize its 44-year-old faculty union.

St. Xavier University in Chicago took a similar stance, as have other religious institutions - taking advantage of the NLRB decision, which is related to a 2018 court case.




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Illinois voters approved a "Workers' Rights Amendment" to the state constitution which broadens the state workforce's rights to collective bargaining.

The Nov. 8 ballot initiative, passed by 58% of Illinois voters, is a broadly worded expansion of the collective bargaining process extending beyond traditional terms and conditions of employment. Backers predict it will have a significant impact on bargaining rights, in both the public and private sectors.

Ann Lousin, professor of Law at the University of Illinois-Chicago, said the amendment could bring major changes to the labor movement in Illinois.

"I think that's going to be a huge thing," Lousin contended. "We're getting a resurgence of workers saying, 'We want to be able to have collective bargaining.' Now, you have an interesting question as to what more rights would workers feel that they should have?"

Lousin said the Illinois amendment, which was originally a resolution passed by the General Assembly, goes beyond the standard protections in current labor law, giving workers the added ability to bargain to, quote, "protect their economic welfare and safety at work." Language in the amendment also blocks Illinois from passing a so-called "right-to-work law," which would end compulsory union membership.

Business groups and others opposed the measure, claiming the amendment would give unions too much power, lead to more labor strikes, and force companies to move to other states.

Lousin noted opponents used fear tactics to gain "no" votes, but more than 2.1 million Illinoisans voted "yes."

"People from the conservative side will say, 'You know, we have a Workers' Rights Amendment in our state constitution, and we have a public pension right, and these are killing us. This is why your taxes are so high.' "

The Illinois State Board of Elections is scheduled to meet Dec. 5 to review the election results and make them official.