Buffalo Commons

Library

View

A Raise for Fast Food Workers Will Help Western New York

Sam Magavern — Jun 3, 2015

The most pressing problems in Western New York in many areas of life, including education, healthcare, and criminal justice, can be traced to a single root: poverty.  Families living in poverty suffer from lower graduation rates, more chronic diseases, and more criminal violence than families earning living wages.  In our region, as around the nation, roughly 45% of workers are employed in low-wage service sector jobs.  Those jobs are not going away; in fact, they are the fastest …

View .PDF

A True Minimum Wage for Tipped Workers

Sam Magavern Nov 13, 2014

The most pressing problems in Western New York in sectors such as education, health, and crime can be traced to a single root: poverty.  Families living in poverty suffer from lower graduation rates, more chronic diseases, and more criminal violence than families earning living wages.  In our region, as around the nation, roughly 45% of workers are employed in low-wage service sector jobs.  Those jobs are not going away; in fact, they are the fastest growing occupations in the …

View .PDF

Raising the Minimum Wage: Key Facts and Figures

Sam Magavern Oct 28, 2014

In New York State, roughly 37% or workers earn low wages (less than $15 per hour, or $31,200 per year).  In Erie County, the percentage is 41% (159,800 of 393,600 wage-earning workers).  94% of low wage workers in New York State are age 20 or over.  67% of those earning low wages are working 35 hours per week or more.  51% of those earning low wages have some college education or more.  53% of low-wage workers are female.  53% are white, 18% are black, 21% are …

View .PDF

The Buffalo Living Wage Ordinance

Joseph Guza — Apr 1, 2012

Buffalo’s Living Wage Ordinance (LWO) provides that certain workers must be paid a living wage.  The goal of the LWO is to make sure that employees working for the City of Buffalo and its contractors earn enough to keep their families out of poverty.  Buffalo’s LWO was passed unanimously in 1995 but was not implemented until 2002.  The LWO was amended in 2002 and 2007.

View .PDF

Strengthening Unemployment Insurance

Robert Mietlicki — Apr 27, 2010

A person’s eligibility for unemployment insurance in New York State is determined by the New York State Unemployment Insurance Law.  A person may be eligible for benefits if he lost his job due to a lack of work, such as the end of seasonal or temporary employment or the downsizing of a company.  A person may also be eligible if he was fired because he did not meet an employer’s qualifications for a job.  A worker may be denied unemployment benefits if he was fired …

View .PDF

Overtime Violations

Lisa Diaz-Ordaz — Apr 26, 2010

Overtime violations are especially prevalent in low wage jobs.  Some of the industries with notably high instances of violations include the restaurant and hotel industries, retail, drug and grocery stores, private households and home health care.  Within these industries, occupations with the most overtime violations include childcare workers, home health care workers, waiters and bartenders, cooks and food preparers, retail salespeople, cashiers and stock clerks.  A quick …

View .PDF

Paid Sick Leave: Should Investing in the Workforce be Mandatory?

Stuart Frame — Apr 22, 2010

Paid sick leave is a benefit supplied to employees: it means that they are allotted a certain amount of days every year when they can call in sick and the employer still pays them for a full day of work. Roughly 86% of U.S. workers currently receive at least some paid sick leave as a benefit from their employers.  While workers at larger businesses have more paid leave than workers at smaller firms, in every sector of the economy the vast majority of workers get paid sick leave.  Most …

View .PDF

City of Buffalo Living Wage Ordinance

City of Buffalo — Dec 31, 2007

The city awards many contracts to private firms to provide services to the public and to city government. Experience indicates that procurement by contract of services has all too often resulted in the payment by service contractors to their employees of wages at or slightly above the minimum required by federal and state minimum wage laws.  Such minimal compensation tends to inhibit the quantity and quality of services rendered by such employees to the city and to the public.  …

View .PDF