
          Framing the Debate from a Worker's View
          By Johnson, KenKen Johnson
          Vol. 10, No. 2, 1988, pp. 24-25
          
          For more than two decades, Southern governments, Chambers of
Commerce, business supporters and others, when measuring the South's
economic well-being and quality of life, have framed the debate on
economic_development and prosperity in the most restrictive terms.
          These debates have focused almost entirely on the number of new
jobs created. Obviously, when measured along these lines, the South of
cheap land, low wages and low taxes has done exceedingly well. For the
ten-year period 1975-1984, for example, Texas, Florida, and Georgia
were among the top five in the U.S. in new job growth, and North
Carolina and Virginia were among the top ten. But absent from these
measures has been any discussion of the impact of these new jobs on
the workers themselves and of the question of whether these new jobs
raised the standard of 

living for the average workers of the
region.
          The Climate for Workers in the U. S., the report released last year
by the Southern Labor Institute, sought to broaden the discussion on
economic_development and job creation policy. The report challenges
the notion that economic_development depends on cheap land,
unreasonable tax concessions through industry, and an unorganized,
untrained and uneducated work force willing to work for less than
workers elsewhere. The document, sharply different from the usual
business climate report, illustrates that despite nation-leading
numerical gains in job growth and recent improvements in state
financing of education, the Southern region has failed to meet
national standards in almost every other way. The South exhibits the
smallest gain in wages and per-capita personal income, the largest
proportion of the working poor, and the highest incidences of
poverty.
          To quote directly from the report, "The challenge and the task
that face the South today and in the future is to create jobs with the
incomes and benefits needed to bring the region's workers above the
poverty level. Not just new jobs as in the past, but jobs that will
significantly improve the standards of living for people who work full
time year round."
          The picture has changed. Local economic developers can no longer
rely on the South's usual selling points: low-cost of production and
an abundant labor supply to attract traditional manufacturing
jobs. Government and private sectors alike have been torn by import
pressures and technological advances which have significantly reduced
the job-creating potential.
          Increasingly the potential for job growth is in service industries,
indigenous small businesses, and information based industries which
have less demand for low production costs and more need for a
well-educated work force, high quality of life, rapid transfer of
goods and information, and access to financial capital.
          In short, our competitive future rests on the quality of our work
force and on the investments we're willing to make in the men and
women who produce the goods and services that bring economic gains.
          Southeastern states have banked their future on job growth while
neglecting the rewards and the protection of their workers. Southern
states fill the bottom rung of nearly all of the more than two dozen
indicators considered in this study of the nation's labor climate. The
South's extraordinary job growth in jobs during the past ten years has
been accompanied by the least change in personal income of any
U.S. region.
          Working people are more likely to be poor in the South than any
other U.S. region. Southeastern states have the lowest per-capita
income in the nation. Nine Southern_states are among the bottom
thirteen in manufacturing wages, averaging less than $8 per hour. In
eight southeastern states, more than 40 percent of the manufacturing
jobs pay less than $8 an hour.
          Treated as a percent of all the manufacturing jobs in each state,
the results show why the southeastern states can rank high in job
growth and yet rank low in wages and income. A significant finding of
the report reveals the poor standings of the southeastern states with
regard to statutory protection of workers, governing the workplace,
protecting workers' rights and safety and providing compensation for
disability and unemployment, the South falls considerably lower than
all the other U.S. regions.
          The report examines the states to see how many of fourteen common
statutes protecting workers were in effect and whether or not their
provision made them meaningful. The eight states with the least worker
protection are in the southeast. In Alabama and Mississippi, not one
of the fourteen laws had been enacted. In South_Carolina, only one. In
Virginia and Louisiana only two; in Tennessee, Florida and North
Carolina, only three. Six of the nine states in the nation with no
state minimum wages are in the Southeast. At the bottom of the benefit
scale, five of the six states that pay the least for permanent
disability, under $200 per week, are in the Southeast. In the nation's
twelve worst states, the weekly unemployment benefits is $100 or less,
and eight of the twelve are in the Southeast, with Mississippi on the
bottom.
          Until recently, blacks and women had been excluded from traditional
white male occupations; officials, administrators, professionals,
technicians and craft-workers. Southern_states ranked on the bottom in
the percent of working women and minorities employed in these jobs.
          The report also considers several indicators of the states' general
quality of life. Among the findings are some historically familiar
refrains. The Northeastern states report the lowest rates of poverty,
from 8 percent in Connecticut to 13 percent in New_York. The
Southeastern states remain the poorest region. Mississippi, with 24
percent of its population in poverty, ranks worst. Blacks are more
likely to be poor in the Southeast. The nine states with the highest
proportion of black poor are in the Southeast. Rates of poverty for
blacks in the southeast range from Virginia's 25 percent to
Mississippi's 44 percent, again, the highest in the nation.
          A telling indicator of the quality of health_care in the state is
its infant mortality rate. Sadly, a baby is not likely to survive its
first year of life in the Southeast. The two states with the worst
infant mortality rates, over fifteen deaths for every thousand births,
are Mississippi and South_Carolina. The eleven worst states, all with
death rates of thirteen or higher, include West_Virginia, Alabama,
North_Carolina, Florida, Louisiana and Georgia.
          We have heard and will continue to hear about the Sunbelt, but job
growth in the Southeast has occurred in large part at the bottom end
of the wage scale and has not improved significantly the conditions or
prospects for wage earners in the region. As the Southeast economy
follows the national trend of fewer manufacturing and more service
sector jobs, the region's employed and unemployed workers are less
likely to see much change in their personal conditions. Reversing
these trends, of course, will depend largely on our ability and
willingness to increase worker participation in both public policy and
the workplace decision making process.
          
            Ken Johnson is director of the Southern Labor Institute
and co-author of The Climate for Workers in the United
States.
          
        
