Saturday, August 24, 2013

This week in the War on Workers: Fending off the ALEC of the construction industry in California

www.dailykos.com/story/2013/08/24/1233139/-This-week-in-the-War-on-Workers-Fending-off-the-ALEC-of-the-construction-industry-in-California
"California law requires that locally funded construction projects over $1,000 pay the prevailing wage. That is, public money doesn't go to drive down wages for construction workers throughout the region. The Associated Builders and Contractors, AKA the ALEC of the construction industry, doesn't like this so much. So it's been turning its attention to charter cities, which can make their own laws, trying to get cities to adopt charters and to eliminate the prevailing wage. This push employs some ridiculous myths, like the claim that cities can save 20 percent on their construction costs by eliminating the prevailing wage—the teeny tiny problem with that claim being that labor costs make up only 22 percent of construction costs in California."