CPD IN THE NEWS

Less than a year after San Francisco passed a first-of-its-kind fair scheduling ordinance for retail employers, progressive activists in Minneapolis began pushing for an even stronger scheduling ordinance of their own—along with paid sick leave, wage theft protections, and the possibility of a $15 minimum wage. 

But the campaign, dubbed the Working Families Agenda, ran into a roadblock earlier this month when its most powerful political ally, Mayor Betsy Hodges, decided to abandon the fair scheduling component. Language in the proposed ordinance called for scheduling notice of at least two weeks in advance and extra “predictability pay” for workers who were scheduled after that threshold. 

Those requirements quickly awoke the local business lobby, typically a fairly dormant political power in a city with a strong progressive streak. In late September, opponents formed the Workforce Fairness Coalition by the Chamber of Commerce, and included prominent members like the Minnesota Business Partnership (which represents about 80 businesses, including Target, U.S. Bancorp and Xcel Energy) and the Minnesota Restaurant Association. They took specific issue with the scheduling law, saying that it would impede operations and could force businesses to flee the city. 

Many progressive activists don’t buy that argument.

“We heard the same arguments from the Chamber of Commerce that are being made in Minneapolis,” says Gordon Mar, who led the campaign to pass San Francisco’s Retail Worker Bill of Rights, which includes fair scheduling. “As we’ve been implementing the law, those arguments have proven to be just as hollow as they were in business’s opposition to other worker-friendly laws."

Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges ran in 2013 on a campaign that promised to directly address the city’s stark racial disparities, aspiring for a “One Minneapolis.” The city has some of the largest gaps in the country between whites and people of color for a number of indicators including rates of high school graduation, homeownership, low-level arrests and employment. 

Those disparities are rampant in the workplace, too. For example, 63 percent of white workers in Minneapolis have access to earned sick time compared with just 32 percent of Latino workers. A Minnesota Department of Health report found that 79 percent of food workers—many of whom are minorities—lacked paid sick time. 

In her 2015 State of the City address just six months ago, Hodges outlined an agenda she said would address economic disparities, specifically calling for an ambitious plan to implement fair scheduling, wage theft protection and paid sick leave. But since then, Hodges appears to have taken business’s concerns to heart. 

“When it comes to fair, predictable scheduling, I have heard from many people, including many business owners, that the issue is complicated and that more time is needed to engage in this important issue,” the mayor said in a statement on October 14. “As a result, I have come to the conclusion that we are not in a position to resolve the concerns satisfactorily on the timeline currently contemplated.”

While Hodges pledged to continue pushing for paid sick leave and wage theft enforcement, activists felt blindsided by her sudden retreat. 

“Our progressive champions were not prepared for the pushback and frankly folded under the pressure, … caving to conservative business elements,” says Anthony Newby, executive director for Minnesota Neighborhoods Organizing for Change, a member of the coalition supporting these policies. “Where does [Hodges] want to be allied? With working people or with the worst actors of the business community?”

The day after Hodges’ announcement, about 300 people streamed into City Hall in downtown Minneapolis to reaffirm support for all aspects of the Working Families Agenda. Workers and organizers spoke about the daily burdens of low-wage work and how they contribute to the racial disparities that plague a city often portrayed as a progressive wonderland. Minneapolis NAACP President Nekima Levy-Pounds described the city’s situation as a tale of two cities: “It’s the best of times if you’re white and the worst of times if you’re black.” 

While the scheduling law language had not been set in stone, many businesses were concerned with its details. At first, advanced notice for schedules was set at four weeks, which was eventually scaled back to two. For every change an employer made to a worker’s schedule within two weeks of the shift, that worker would earn an hour’s wage worth of “predictability pay.” For any schedule change within 24 hours of a shift, a worker would get four hours’ pay. 

Opponents were quick to cast this as an unrealistic policy with a costly burden placed on employers, and would be completely unworkable for restaurants, retailers and many other businesses that they say are dependent on “flexible” scheduling models. Advocates are quick to point out, though, that current workplace scheduling standards put all the cost on workers. For example, if a worker relies on childcare during her shifts and an employer tells her to stay late, many childcare centers charge fees for late pickups; or, having already spent money on childcare and transit, she could arrive at work to find her shift has been cut. 

On fair scheduling, says Elianne Farhat with the Center for Popular Democracy’s Fair Workweek Initiative, it’s clear there’s going to be a cost. “What gets lost in the conversation is that it’s not that there isn’t a cost right now— it’s just that the workers are bearing that cost,” Farhat says. “What [fair scheduling] is trying to do is balance that cost.” 

Despite Hodges’ call for more time to parse out details on scheduling, activists aren’t backing off. Her announcement seems to have galvanized many local organizations that previously were on the fence. Organizers say they will continue to advocate for paid sick leave and wage theft protections in the immediate future while aiming for an eventual victory on fair scheduling. 

Compromises will likely need to be made. While San Francisco’s scheduling law applied only to big chain stores, Minneapolis’s fair scheduling proposal is universal. That may need to be scaled back, according to activists: Some added flexibility for “predictability pay” requirements may be needed, and further discussion about phase-in periods for smaller businesses will likely be coming. But organizers say they didn’t expect an easy path to passing the strongest scheduling law in the country. In fact, at a city council meeting last week two members announced a plan to refer the proposed paid sick leave policy to a new committee made up of workers, labor leaders, employers and business associations that would meet in mid-November and hash out details.

“‘No’ is not an answer. The question is what does it take to get a yes,” says Newby. “We need to figure out what is that sweet spot that’s gonna work for us. That may take a little bit more time.”

Source: In These Times

Minnesota consistently ranks at the top in terms of voter turnout. It earns accolades for the quality and competence of its election administration. Recently Secretary of State Steve Simon challenged Minnesotans to register and vote so that the state can continue to be the leader when it comes to election turnout. Yet that high turnout comes with a racial gap that is among the worst in the country.

Minnesota is a land of racial disparities, such as in education. Minnesota Department of Education data point to blacks and other students of color scoring 30 points or more lower on achievement tests compared to whites. U.S. Department of Education data show Minnesota near the bottom of the list in on-time high school graduation rates for blacks, with an overall 67 percent graduation for black males (compared to 90 percent for white males), according to the 2015 Schott Foundation for Public Education report. The black/white male graduation gap is one of the highest in the country. A 2014 study found black students 10 times more likely to be suspended or expelled from Minneapolis schools than white students.

Income and employment

Second, look at income and unemployment. A 2013 Minnesota Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report found the unemployment gap for blacks to be three times that of whites. A 2015 report by the Center for Popular Democracy found the gap to be second worst among states in the nation, only behind Wisconsin. And 2015 U.S. Census data point to Minnesota as having one of the highest black/white gaps in medium family income in the nation. WalletHub, a personal finance site, documented the financial gap between whites and minorities in Minnesota as the biggest in the nation, with median income (4th highest), home ownership (3rd), poverty rate (3rd) and education level (14th).

In criminal justice, groups such as the Sentencing Project note Minnesota among the worst when it comes to racial disparities in terms of incarceration. And the Institute for Metropolitan Opportunity 2015 report “Why Are the Twin Cities So Segregated?” confirmed what john powell and I had documented a generation ago at the Institute on Race and Poverty: that the seven-county metro region has one of the worst residential and educational segregation patterns in the country.

Now consider the racial disparities in voting. WalletHub earlier this year released a study examining political engagement among blacks, using six criteria. It found Minnesota ranked 16th. Among notable failures, Minnesota was 45th in the nation for black voter turnout in the 2014 elections. According to the U.S. Census Bureau in the 2012 elections, 80.2 percent of white non-Hispanic citizens registered to vote, compared to 66.9 percent and 56.1 prcent for blacks and Hispanics. In terms of actually voting, white non-Hispanic turnout was 74 percent, compared to 49.2 percent and 32.5 percent for blacks and Hispanics. For Asian-Americans, their registration was greater overall than for white non-Hispanics at 87.6 percent, but actual turnout was only 56.2 percent.

Why the disparity in registration and voting? It is no coincidence that the poverty, education and incarceration disparities along with the residential segregation are related to the lower voter turnout. Political scientists have long documented the correlations between income, education, and geography. High incarceration rates bring felon disenfranchisement, contributing to decreased eligibility to register and vote.

Low voter turnout compounds other disparities

Low voter turnout among people of color feeds upon itself, compounding other racial disparities and problems. People of color are unable to electorally challenge employment or housing policies. They are unable to challenge policing policies, and they are unable to challenge the voting laws and procedures that may hinder their political engagement.

Minnesota must address the racial voting disparity, especially in light of the growing diversity of the state population. It will require not just addressing problems in the voting laws including felon disenfranchisement, but also tackling the other racial disparities that contribute to the voting problems. If it does not, Minnesota risks perpetuation of a second-class citizenship for many of its people.

By David Schultz

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The city of Saratoga Springs is considering a ban on the sale of guns and ammunition at the City Center, Mayor Meg Kelly announced this weekend in a welcoming speech to Local Progress New York.

Read the full article here.

JACKSON HOLE, Wyo.—Federal Reserve officials sought to reassure a group of labor activists that the central bank isn’t going to cool down the economy just as a stronger labor market is reaching a broader swath of Americans.

“We’re going to run [the economy] hot, get the unemployment rate down lower,” San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank President John Williams said at an unprecedented meeting with activists from the Campaign for Popular Democracy’s Fed Up Campaign.

The meeting of activists and high-ranking Fed officials took place shortly before the start of the Kansas City Fed’s high-profile policy conference in Jackson Hole, Wyo. Central bankers in attendance included Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen’s two top lieutenants, New York Fed President William Dudley and Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer. Ms. Yellen, although scheduled to speak at the Jackson Hole symposium early Friday, didn’t attend.

The left-leaning activist group Fed Up publicly met with eight Federal Reserve presidents Thursday to discuss inequality and interest rates during the central bank's annual meeting in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Nine regional Fed bank presidents and two governors held a public discussion with the left-leaning group, whose goal is to convince Fed officials to keep short-term interest rates low to boost short-term growth and drive unemployment further down. It came as pressure mounts on Fed officials on many fronts to explain a disappointing economy.

Several Fed Up activists argued the only way to lower unemployment in the black community is to heat up the broader labor market.

Rod Adams, a 27-year-old community group organizer from Minneapolis, told the meeting, “I don’t understand how you can think that,” when confronting Fed officials’ statement that the U.S. is near full employment.

“I don’t want to be sacrificed for a war against an inflation enemy that isn’t here,” Mr. Adams said.

Transcript: Fed Officials Meet With Fed Up Activists at Jackson Hole

Fed Up activists also challenged Fed representatives on diversity. The group doubled down on its earlier criticism of the Federal Reserve’s leadership as overly male, almost entirely white and drawn too frequently from the banking community.

The composition of Federal Reserve leadership has also received criticism from Democratic elected officials who say the institution doesn’t adequately reflect the demographics of the nation it is meant to serve.

New York Fed President William Dudley told the meeting Thursday that the Fed’s record on diversity has been “pretty lousy.” His counterpart from the Minneapolis Fed, Neel Kashkari, said that “we have made progress and can make more progress.”

A recent paper by the Brookings Institution noted that of the 134 different presidents of regional Fed banks in history, none has been Hispanic or African-American. Ms. Yellen is the central bank’s first female leader, and she and Federal Reserve governor Lael Brainard are two of only nine women to serve on the Fed’s board in its history. Currently, two of the Fed’s 12 regional banks—Cleveland and Kansas City—have female presidents.

The central bankers at Thursday’s meeting expressed support for the issues that Fed Up questioners raised. However they also argued that the Fed’s main goal should be avoiding another recession and promoting maximum employment and price stability.

Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer praised the group for setting up the discussions, but he called on the activists to research the issues that confront the communities involved.

“When you get the facts, when you get the analysis, you can make a difference. When you speak about how bad the problem is it’s a much less effective tool,” the former Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor said.

Write to Harriet Torry at harriet.torry@wsj.com

Corrections & Amplifications:

U.S. Federal Reserve officials argued that the central bank’s main goal should be avoiding another recession and promoting maximum employment and price stability. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said they argued that the goal should include promoting maximum unemployment. [Aug. 26]

By Harriet Torry

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