[nfbmi-talk] balt sun on subminimum wage for pwd

[joe harcz Comcast]

Subminimum wage for disabled workers called exploitative  frame

 

Some paid pennies per hour for limited work

June 14, 2014|By Alison Knezevich, The Baltimore Sun

 

At a noisy warehouse off Veterans Highway in Millersville, a young woman concentrates as she pokes black shoelaces into cardboard packaging. In another

room, workers slowly count tiny bottles of hair products, placing them in plastic bags that will end up as samples in salons.

 

To some, these workers with developmental disabilities are getting valuable on-the-job-training and the self-respect that comes with employment. Others

say they're being exploited — because wages in the facility, run by a nonprofit, are as low as 25 cents an hour.

 

A nearly 80-year-old exemption in the U.S. Fair Labor Standards Act allows employers across the country to pay so-called "subminimum" wages to hundreds

of thousands of people with disabilities. In Maryland, some disabled workers have been paid as little as a penny an hour in recent years, according to

documents obtained by The Baltimore Sun through public-information laws.

 

One person was paid 68 cents an hour to assemble trophies, records from the U.S. Department of Labor show. Another received an hourly

rate

of $3.20 to do laundry for a uniform company. And one made $2.44 an hour to sweep, mop and straighten shelves at a thrift store.

 

A debate about the wages paid to these disabled workers has divided nonprofits in Maryland and nationally. Opponents say the system is holding back participants,

feeding a cycle of low expectations and dependency. Under the exemption, there is no limit on how long workers can hold the low-paying jobs.

 

"You set people's expectations very low, you say this is all you could ever hope for — and then that's what you're stuck with," said Chris Danielsen of

the Baltimore-based National Federation of the Blind, which has been trying for years to eliminate the subminimum wage.

 

"What's really between people with disabilities and their dreams, and having a normal productive life, is the low expectations," he said.

 

Some nonprofits that serve people with disabilities defend the program — known as 14(c) for the exemption in federal labor law — as a tool to help workers

find employment. The jobs provide a paycheck while the workers gain training. Without

it ,

they might not get any work at all, supporters say.

 

"This gives them the ability to work and still

earn money

and gain self-esteem with medical and behavioral supports still in place," said Vicki Callahan, executive director of the nonprofit Opportunity Builders

Inc., which employs the people working in the Millersville warehouse. "A lot of people who walk through this building would say, 'I never thought they

could do work.' The fact is, they can — with support."

 

All sides agree that the unemployment rate among people with disabilities is troubling. Just over 19 percent of disabled people work — compared with 68

percent of all Americans 16 and older, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

 

Those who favor the 14(c) program say that without it, the numbers would be even bleaker.

 

"Many employers are not willing to give these folks a chance," said Martin Lampner,

CEO

of Chimes, a Baltimore-based nonprofit that offers services for people with developmental disabilities.

 

Debate about the subminimum wage drew attention in 2012, when the National Federation of the Blind urged a boycott of Goodwill Industries because of its

CEO's half-million-dollar salary, but efforts to abolish the 14(c) program began decades ago.

 

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Rep. Gregg Harper, a Mississippi Republican, has been an ally of the Federation of the Blind in the campaign. He has sponsored the Fair Wages for Disabled

Workers Act, which would phase out the 14(c) program over three years.

 

To Harper, the low wages are a form of discrimination, one that is stopping people from reaching their full potential.

 

"We believe that what we're seeing is just extremely unfair," said Harper, whose son, Livingston, has the intellectual disability Fragile X syndrome.

 

The issue again gained a national spotlight in February, when President Barack Obama signed an executive order requiring federal contractors to pay all

workers — including the disabled — $10.10 per hour.

 

In Maryland, advocates had hoped that this year's political focus on raising the state's minimum wage would bring attention to disabled people

earning

subminimum pay, but no one introduced legislation to address the issue.

 

"If you're speaking about wages and improving living conditions, then you have to have that discussion with the entire workforce," said Dan Schmitt, a board

member of the Arc of Maryland, which has joined the campaign to end the subminimum wage.

 

Pay based on productivity

 

Through the U.S. Department of Labor, employers can apply for a Special Minimum Wage Certificate, which gives them permission to pay less than the federal

minimum wage — currently $7.25 an hour — to workers who have disabilities. Maryland has about 45 such employers, according to the department.

 

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Source:

http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2014-06-14/news/bs-md-subminimum-wage-20140614_1_disabled-workers-subminimum-wage-low-paying-jobs