To its credit, the Albuquerque

Journal has granted space to a number of opinion pieces on the upcoming vote to increase the Minimum Wage.

ABQjournal: Lack of Data Foils Minimum Wage Evaluation By David Pfeffer, Santa Fe City Councilor

High toned

phrases highlighted Santa Fe’s “living wage” debate. Proponents haughtily blamed business for getting rich off

“the backs of the poor.” One adult working in two jobs or two adults working in one family proved reason enough to “do something about

it.” Articulate opposition could not hold against this supposedly moral stand. …

We do know that some employers have

relocated. The local newspaper’s printing plant has left town, leaving only the white collar staff within the city limits. We know of

businesses that have opted not to come here. …

[W]e may be kicking up by another dollar an hour this fact-blind

insistence on a supposedly moral stand— a stand taken, not only without regard to “immigrant status,” but without regard to

the damage it is doing to the very people it is supposedly designed to help.

David Pfeffer, a Republican

running for the U.S. Senate, was the only Santa Fe city councilor to vote against the wage ordinance.

class="mine">The sniveling tone of the preceding may be all the reason one needs to vote against Pfeffer in any election. I’m amazed any

business finds it cheaper to relocate; such a business cares as little about its customers as it does about its employees. Read the whole

thing to see just how important the “immigrant status” issue is to him (and a block of xenophobic Republicans).

In spite of

Pfeffer’s claim that there is no data on Santa Fe (which hardly supports voting against the issue in Albuquerque), what do you

know, here’s some data….

ABQjournal: Higher Pay Good for Santa Fe Workers,

Economy By Monsignor Jerome Martinez and City Councilor David Coss, Living Wage Advocates

Here are some key

facts:

# We have reduced poverty. According to a report just issued by the state Human Services

Department, recipients of Temporary Aid to Needy Families have fallen 9.7 percent in the last year, while in the state as a whole it has

only gone down 0.6 percent.

# We have gained jobs. According to a Sept. 22 report from the New Mexico

Department of Labor, 1,400 jobs have been added to the Santa Fe work force since the living wage came into effect. This 2.3 percent rate

of job growth is a little more than the state’s 2.1 percent job growth rate during this same period. Santa Fe’s 2.3 percent growth rate

is very high, as the state’s job growth, at 2.1 percent, ranked 12th highest in the country.

The hospitality industry in

Santa Fe did even better, adding 300 jobs, a 3.2 percent growth rate. The unemployment rate in Santa Fe in August was 3.8 percent, down

from 4.1 percent a year ago. The Santa Fe rate is much better than the state as a whole, which had 5.3 percent unemployment last month.

…

Low-wage workers often have to choose between putting food on the table or leaving their children alone and working a second

or third job.

The typical low-wage worker is not a teenager and is not new to the workforce. Forty percent

are single moms. The average age of low-wage workers is 31 years. They have been working an average of over 13 years.

class="mine">Note improvements in the hospitality industry, which depends a lot on low-wage workers.

No one can be surprised the

Journal comes out against the measure. Their support of public campaign financing does stun me, though.

ABQjournal: Recommendations On Ballot Propositions

Living Wage, No: Albuquerque should avoid being at

the bleeding edge of economic actions more appropriately taken by federal or state government. And voters should be wary of a clause

inside the Trojan Horse measure that sacks employers’ right to control access to their work place.

Public

Campaign Finance, Yes: The municipal campaign trail is being repaved in gold every four years. … The price tag: one-tenth of 1

percent of the city’s operational budget.

Ripping up the golden campaign trail may have unintended and unfortunate

consequences, just like McCain-Feingold got hijacked by the independent “527” committees. But restraining political inflation is

worth a try.

“Worth a try.” Wow, the Journal backs an experiment and its attendant risks. Surely

the same argument supports raising the Minimum Wage and tweaking it as we see its impact. mjh

ABQjournal: Guest Columns [mjh: in some strange lottery-

fashion, various pages at the Journal are free now and then — as the pro-ordinance article quoted above is today.]