Summer Fest Loophole Passes
Well, it’s not exactly surprising: Council unanimously passed an amendment to the city living wage law to exempt the Ann Arbor Summer Festival. As Chris Easthope argued, “the festival’s seasonal employees — almost all students — are not the kind of workers the wage law was meant to protect.” We’re sure that they aren’t.
You’d think that student journalists might be interested in our local government’s ongoing debate on how they can best change laws to discriminate against students. But the Daily devotes its one story about last night’s Council meeting to some public commenters who don’t want the AAPD participating in immigration enforcement. Perhaps it’s appropriate that today’s opinion page carries a column ruminating about summer internships and whether they really allow one the “time to examine the world and your place in it” that a “gap year” study-abroad program could provide. With these kinds of pressing questions to ponder, one can’t expect them to focus on their classmates who have to spend a summer scraping out trash barrels.
CORRECTION: The quotation above — “the festival’s seasonal employees — almost all students — are not the kind of workers the wage law was meant to protect” — is the characterization of News writer Judy McGovern, not Easthope’s actual words, as we should have noted. Easthope writes, “I appreciate your concerns on this issue and I limited this amendment to a single small event. I have no bias toward students whether in high school or college. I had to pay my own way through college and law school and understand what students, especially college and graduate students face. I was also proud to advocate for and support the living wage law when we passed it on council years ago. If you review the council video you will note that I never mentioned anything about excluding students.”
Gosh, if it unacceptably raises the costs of putting on the festival, is it even slightly possible that this law might have negative effects elsewhere? Like on everybody else who has to follow it? I wonder if that ever occurred to anybody on the city council.
posted by Kim Scarborough on April 8th, 2008 at 2:35 pm eI am sure the city council understood that imposing the living wage law would negatively affect businesses bottom lines. I think they were most likely indifferent to it. See how their attitude changed when the law came around to affect their own bottom line?
If the purpose of the living wage was to ensure that workers can afford basic needs, then there is no excuse for exempting the government from it’s own regulation. If not being able to afford it is an excuse for the government then why should it not be an excuse for the local car wash, or any other business who needs cheap labor?
It would be nice to see a boycott of summer fest, and I for one would support it. But then again, we’re still talking about Ann Arbor.
posted by Tit for Tat on April 9th, 2008 at 9:28 am eI think it’s already been pointed out here, but there’s NO WAY we’re boycotting Strange Fruit. They could be skewering puppies as they sway back and forth, I just have to see that most artsiest of arsty performances “using a unique elevated medium” (stick).
It’s like NASCAR for Ann Arbor.
posted by Man Invents Pole Dancing on April 9th, 2008 at 11:48 am e“If not being able to afford it is an excuse for the government then why should it not be an excuse for the local car wash, or any other business who needs cheap labor?”
The Ann Arbor living wage ordinance only applies to the city itself and companies with city contracts — not the local car wash. The Summer Festival was not subject to the ordinance either unless it accepted more than $10,000 in grant money from the city. The change allows the city to provide more support for the Summer Festival and still not have to pay the ‘living wage’ rate to its temporary seasonal employees.
The council did recognize, when it passed the living wage ordinance, that a much higher minimum wage in Ann Arbor for private employers would likely drive businesses outside the city limits.
posted by mw on April 9th, 2008 at 4:09 pm eI was watching when this was discussed at a recent council meeting. I think tit for tat is referring to the fact that the city itself still has some seasonal employees that do not receive the living wage. Most of them are high school and college students who work at the pools, golf courses, etc. If you look back at the original living wage discussion, the council at the time was worried that if you excluded seasonal workers companies might move people from full to part time to evade the wage.
The city itself cannot do that because of their labor contracts.
No one who had the living wage lost it in this most recent action.
Over the last 5 or 6 years the city has taken action to force the DDA to extend the living wage to parking garage workers and the city paid extra itself to extend it to workers at the trash sorting-recycling facility.
MW is correct in that the living wage only applies to companies that have contracts with the city.
posted by LauraB on April 10th, 2008 at 12:07 am eI agree with Councilperson Easthope that there should be an exemption due to the fact that it will encourage employers to hire students and give them more job opportunities.
posted by Mark Koroi on April 10th, 2008 at 6:33 pm eI did not know that the living wage law only applied to the city itself and companies with city contracts. Although it still seems kind of strange to start making exceptions if you truly believed in the law’s purpose.
posted by Tit for Tat on April 11th, 2008 at 10:01 am eHow much you want to bet that keeping the living wage for the Ann Arbor Summer Festival would not have bankrupted the event or raised prices any higher than they already are but would lower the profit margins of the businesses that sell there?
posted by Chuck L. on April 13th, 2008 at 11:15 pm e“How much you want to bet that keeping the living wage for the Ann Arbor Summer Festival would not have bankrupted the event or raised prices any higher than they already are but would lower the profit margins of the businesses that sell there?”
It wasn’t the Summer Festival that would have been hurt, but rather the city. As it was, the festival was receiving
posted by mw on April 14th, 2008 at 8:34 am eIt wasn’t the Summer Festival that would have been hurt, but rather the city. As it was, the festival was receiving…
Stupid web software seems to have eaten most of my comment. Let me try again.
The festival was receiving
posted by mw on April 14th, 2008 at 8:41 am echuck l: $100
posted by peter honeyman on April 14th, 2008 at 8:51 am eof course, i don’t want your $100. how about if the loser of the bet donates to a charity of the winners choice?
posted by peter honeyman on April 14th, 2008 at 8:55 am e“How much you want to bet that keeping the living wage for the Ann Arbor Summer Festival would not have bankrupted the event or raised prices any higher than they already are but would lower the profit margins of the businesses that sell there?”
It’s my understanding that the ordinance would have only applied to the people working for the festival and, by proxy, the city, not the regular restaurant booth workers, who are paid by their respective bosses. The folks working in the restaurants made a lot more than we did back when I worked there.
Now, certainly, the city could have raised the fee required of the vendors in order to offset the labor costs, which would have cut into the profit margins. But I’d bet that would be reflected in higher costs for the food there. I don’t recall exactly how much Tio’s had to toss in to get a booth there, but I remember that it was significant, and it wasn’t until the catering infrastructure was already there for them before they were able to make a serious go of it and get the booth (and even then, a fair amount of that was the Seivers being civic-minded, rather than profit driven, as they likely could have made more money with the same resources applied elsewhere).
posted by js on April 14th, 2008 at 2:36 pm eJS,
If the food vendors could raise prices more than what they are now, why do they need an excuse? The price of a commodity is exactly what it will fetch; the vendors should already be charging what the market will bear and anything more or less will reduce their current take. Now of course, this is an approximation and I assume there are reasonable limits on how much cost increase the vendors could take. If the city went fee crazy, vendors would start to drop out leaving fewer of them; however the few that remain would see higher demand and in theory could charge more. My point is that one should not just assume that businesses can pass on any and every cost increase to the consumer. It’s entirely possible the city could raise fees to cover the living wage and prices to consumers would not increase. Finally, I’m tempted to take Peter up on his offer since the way to test the theory is see how much of a decrease in prices will be passed on to the consumer now that those ungrateful workers are paid less!
posted by Chuck L. on April 17th, 2008 at 2:42 pm eDidja know the city is also paying people at the “top” $150K! a few short years ago one person was making $100K and now we have over a dozen! And your services are suffering, because your manpower is being cut at the bottom to pay for the top…..living wage. Can’t enslave the african american anymore so we enslave the illegals. Well? What did you think was happening to them?
posted by melbrookes on April 30th, 2008 at 1:01 pm e