Lou Cannon: California and New York Lead on Wages, Family Leave

Bypassing seven years of congressional inaction and accelerating a national trend, state legislatures in California and New York have passed laws that will gradually raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. In separate legislation these states have also extended family leave for workers who take time off to care for their newborn.

Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia now have wage floors above the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures (see Bird’s eye view). The federal minimum has been stuck at this level since 2009 and there are no prospects for raising it during this presidential election year.

Taken together, California and New York are home to more than 57 million people, about a sixth of all Americans. The minimum wage bill signed into law by Democratic governors in these two states have similar goals but also differences produced by legislative compromise. Such compromises have eluded Congress, where Democrats favor and Republicans oppose increasing the federal minimum.

Away from the nation’s capital, the minimum wage is a somewhat less partisan issue. In 2014, voters in four Republican-leaning states – Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota – approved minimum wage hikes by substantial margins. Legislatures in 10 states also approved minimum wage increases in 2014; Rhode Island joined the list in 2015.

There is considerable variety in the wage floors of the states, depending in large part on economic conditions. Some states have been creative in the standards they have adopted. Nevada, for instance, has an $8.25 minimum for businesses that do not provide health care for their workers and a $7.25 minimum for those that do.

Economists differ on the impact of increasing the minimum wage, a centerpiece of the liberal agenda favored by Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. Presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump has wavered on the issue, first opposing a minimum wage increase and lately hinting that he might favor it. Proponents of increases say present minimums are well below a living wage. Opponents assert that boosting the minimum will force businesses to reduce jobs and in doing so hurt people that the wage increases are meant to help.

When Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed the California minimum wage increase into law, he called it a matter of “economic justice” but acknowledged the possibility of hardships for some at the bottom end of the economic scale. On balance, he said, the benefits outweighed the drawbacks. Brown brokered the compromise under which California avoided an expensive ballot initiative campaign. The law raises minimum wages in six stages to $15 an hour by the end of 2022.

The New York law will raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2018 – but only in New York City. Unlike California’s one-size-fits-all measure, the New York measure sets varying rates and timetables in different parts of the Empire State. Long Island and Westchester County will not reach the $15 minimum until 2021; areas north of Westchester will then have a minimum wage of $12.50 an hour.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) had wanted a uniform minimum throughout the state, but the state senate, narrowly controlled by Republicans, insisted on variable wage floors. Did the senate save Cuomo from himself? Some conservatives think so; they say less affluent areas cannot afford the same minimum as New York City.

Such an argument could be made with even greater force in California, the nation’s most populous state and third largest in size. A New York Times analysis of the new California law suggests it could be beneficial in places such as San Francisco and San Jose, where the minimum wage is half or less of the median wage, but not in Fresno or Merced, in California’s central valley, where the new minimum will be three-fourths of the median wage. “Many economists are concerned that the measure may lead to job losses in places where the minimum wage will be relatively close to what the typical worker is expected to earn,” the Times said.

The Golden State is a study in contrasts. Economic growth is surging, and the jobless rate, although still higher than the national average, has dropped to 6.3 percent. But California has the nation’s highest poverty rate at 23.6 percent. The county with the state’s worst poverty rate is Fresno, at 28.6 percent.

California also has vast disparities in wage growth. According to a Los Angeles Times study, the 482,000 Californians employed in technology, entertainment, publishing and other information businesses have seen their average weekly wage rise 44 percent since 2010 while the 5.2 million people in education, health and hospitality jobs have seen small increases and in some cases taken pay cuts. The gap between high-income and low-income Californians is twice as large as it was in 1980, the Public Policy Institute of California reported last week.

California’s legislature, solidly controlled by Democrats, has embarked on a series of efforts aimed at helping lower-paid workers and young parents who leave work to care for their families. Last month the legislature approved an expanded family leave program that, beginning in 2018, will provide most workers with 60 percent of their wages for up to six weeks, capped at about $1,l00 a week. Those making $20,000 or less annually will receive 70 percent of their regular pay. While the law makes no gender distinction, its principal beneficiaries will be working mothers.

In signing the bill Gov. Brown said he was trying to compensate for the “gross inequality” that has become a central political issue in the United States and several other countries.

The measure, costing an estimated $587 million annually when fully implemented, will be financed by an increase in payroll deductions through the state’s disability insurance system. Some Republicans fear this could prove a drag on the economy, but there was little organized opposition. The California Chamber of Commerce, a major lobbying force in Sacramento, did not take a position on the bill.

Government-subsidized family leave is commonplace in industrialized countries in Europe and Asia but rare in the United States. This was noted by President Obama in a statement praising the new California law. “Congress needs to catch up to California—and to countries all over the world—by acting to guarantee paid family leave to all Americans,” Obama said.

Three other U.S. states provide modest amounts of family leave. New York in March extended partial pay from six weeks to 12 weeks. New Jersey and Rhode Island provide partial pay for up to six weeks.

State experiments in providing family leave and higher wage floors demonstrate a valuable feature of the U.S. federal system. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis long ago suggested that states can serve as laboratories of democracy, trying out “novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.”

In 1932 when Brandeis wrote this oft-quoted dissenting opinion, the federal government was not the behemoth it is today. Too often, however, Washington resembles a hapless giant, divided by partisanship and deadlocked by the politics of maneuver.

Now, more than ever, leadership and experimentation are needed from the states. The nation can learn from what’s happening in California and New York.

States Play Conflicted Role in Immigration Debate

With national immigration reform stymied by partisan division, several states have extended privileges associated with U.S. citizenship to millions of unauthorized immigrants. At the same time states are leading the legal charge against President Obama’s executive orders protecting up to 5 million immigrants from deportation.

California is in the forefront of states accommodating unauthorized immigrants. Hundreds of thousands of them flocked to 150 Department of Motor Vehicle offices and four special processing centers last month as the Golden State rolled out a law allowing anyone 18 and over to obtain a driver’s license after passing road knowledge and driving tests. Two of three persons who took the written test in a language other than English failed to pass on the first try. Even so, the DMV licensed 40,000 new drivers in January and is on track to reach a three-year goal of 1.4 million new licenses.

The new law has been largely welcomed by law enforcement officers as a safety issue. Julie Powell, a spokeswoman for the California Highway Patrol, said that requiring unauthorized immigrants already on the road to pass a driving test and obtain insurance will bolster public safety.

California’s liberalized policy on driver’s licenses is the latest in a series of laws that have eased the lives of unauthorized immigrants, called “undocumented” by their advocates and “illegal” by their detractors. California is home to nearly a fourth of all such immigrants in the United States -- 2.8 million out of 11.6 million, according to Pew Research figures.

In 2014 California enacted 26 laws on immigration, many removing long-existing barriers. Unauthorized immigrants in California can now receive subsidized health care, student loans and financial aid and licenses to practice law and medicine. Child welfare courts no longer make immigration status a determinant of guardianship.

These laws reflect the liberal political leanings of a state where Democrats hold every statewide office and control the legislature. More fundamentally, they reflect a sea change in public perceptions of Latin American and Asian immigrants, not long ago regarded as a drain on the state. In 1994, California voters approved a ballot initiative intended to deny educational and medical benefits to unauthorized immigrants. Courts found most of this initiative unconstitutional but vestiges remained on the books until 2014, when they were repealed at the behest of Latino legislators.

A recent survey by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) found that Californians are more likely to say that immigrants are a benefit to California because of their hard work and job skills (63 percent) than to say that immigrants are a burden to the state because they use public services (32 percent). A solid majority (69 percent) support President Obama's executive action of Nov. 20, 2014, that could shield as many as five million immigrants from deportation.

It’s not only California where attitudes and laws are changing. Ten states and the District of Columbia now issue driver’s licenses to unauthorized immigrants and another three states offer conditional licenses. Eighteen states grant immigrants in-state college tuition. Five states -- California, Minnesota, New Mexico, Texas and Washington -- provide financial assistance for immigrant students.

On the other side of the coin a lawsuit filed by 26 states would roll back Obama’s executive orders and make it easier to deport immigrants. Texas, which originated the suit, demonstrates the paradox of the states’ response to illegal immigration. On the one hand, the Lone Star State provides financial aid to immigrants; on the other, it spearheads a lawsuit that could speed their deportation.

The lawsuit seeks to block implementation of Obama’s immigration orders, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and Deferred Action for Parental Accountability (DAPA), which the federal government will roll out in May. These programs shield from deportation the “Dreamers” who were brought to the United States illegally as children and parents who’ve lived in the United States continuously for at least five years.

Texas, led by Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican who was the state attorney general when the lawsuit was filed, chose the federal court in Brownsville, Texas in the hope of drawing U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen, known for conservative views on immigration issues. The case was indeed assigned to Hanen, who has heard arguments and could rule at any time.

Whatever Hanen decides, the ruling will be only the beginning of a protracted legal battle. Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, one of 33 big-city mayors who have filed briefs in support of Obama’s executive orders, anticipates that Hanen will rule against them but expects the orders to be upheld on appeal. The U.S. Supreme Court has long held that immigration is a federal responsibility.

Meanwhile, the debate continues in Congress and the states with dim prospects for substantive reform. Neither side has distinguished itself. Those who oppose the anti-deportation orders often cite risks to public safety despite studies showing that unauthorized immigrants commit fewer crimes than the general population. But immigrant advocates also exaggerate. Their claim, for instance, that border security is adequate was exposed as dubious last summer when thousands of frightened Central American children walked freely across Mexico and into the United States.

Obama’s immigration record is problematic. Campaigning for the presidency, he promised to propose immigration reform legislation. Had he done so in 2009 or 2010 when Democrats controlled both congressional chambers, it is conceivable a bill might have passed. But Obama did not put forward an immigration bill until his second term. By this time, Republicans controlled the House and declined to act on a Senate-passed bill.

Before his epiphany last November, Obama had deported more than four million immigrants, in many cases breaking up families for minor offenses. Although the executive orders he announced are welcomed by Latinos, they are clouded by the legal battle over their constitutionality and lack of permanence: the orders will expire when Obama leaves office unless extended by his successor.

The plight of these immigrants poses a political danger for Republicans. The GOP took control of the Senate and expanded its House majority in 2014 by winning states and districts with relatively few Latino voters. It will be more difficult to win the presidency on an anti-illegal immigrant platform. Latinos were a key element of the coalition that twice carried Obama to victory. Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee who had called upon illegal immigrants to “self-deport,” received only 27 percent of the Latino vote. Political analyst Larry Sabato estimates the Republican presidential nominee in 2016 will need 40 percent of the Latino vote to win, about what President George W. Bush received when he was re-elected in 2004.

Another Bush -- Jeb, a potential presidential candidate -- knows from experience that treatment of immigrants is an issue loaded with pitfalls. In 2004, as governor of Florida, Bush proposed issuing driver’s licenses to unauthorized immigrants. Hostile Republican reaction killed the plan. Bush was left to lick his political wounds and warn that “the situation of illegal immigrants won’t go away.”

Twice in the past month the issue has flared along party lines in states likely to be battlegrounds in the 2016 presidential election.

In the Virginia Senate the Democratic minority united to kill a bill that would have repealed a law allowing immigrants to obtain in-state tuition. The bill failed by a single vote because one Republican senator defected and another was absent.

In Colorado, where Republicans won State Senate control in 2014, a Senate budget committee blocked release of funds for an existing program that provides driver’s licenses to unauthorized immigrants. Such licenses are now being issued in a single southwest Denver office where appointments are booked for the rest of 2015.

These actions suggest that treatment of unauthorized immigrants will be a potent issue this year in the states, absent unexpected action on immigration reform in Washington. Republicans and Democrats don’t agree on much, but both sides could say with Jeb Bush that the issue isn’t going away.

-- By Lou Cannon