Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Three-Tier Race-Based Wage Scales in Manhattan
Glen Ford, BAR executive editor
20 Oct 2009
🖨️ Print Article

constructionA Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

Click the flash player below to listen or the mic to download.

A full-blown apartheid labor regime flourished in the Manhattan construction industry, with Irish immigrant workers at the top of the heap. New York's attorney general is demanding millions in back wages and an end to racial discrimination on the job. “If you give the bosses enough leeway, they'll bring back slavery.”
Three-Tier Race-Based Wage Scales in Manhattan
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
“Irish on top, African Americans a distant second, Latinos at the bottom.”
Racial apartheid has reared its head in New York City’s construction industry. State Attorney general Andrew Cuomo has charged a major Manhattan contractor with creating a three-tiered wage scale, with Irish construction workers on top, African Americans a distant second and Latinos at the bottom. The company allegedly cheated workers of all ethnicities out of overtime, while forcing them to work as long as 70 hours a week.
Attorney General Cuomo is seeking $4 million in back wages and overtime and demanding an end to racial discrimination on the job. Members of the carpenters union found blatantly illegal and racist practices at about ten Manhattan construction sites. The race-based wage scale paid Irish workers $25 an hour; Blacks made about $18 an hour, and Latino workers, most of them immigrants, were paid just $15. According to union organizers, the Irish workers were also upset that Latinos did the same work but were paid $10 an hour less.
It should be noted that these glaring violations of labor and civil rights laws occurred before the Crash of last year, at the height of Wall Street’s housing and office construction bubble, when employment in the building trades was relatively high. The conventional wisdom is that management’s ability to divide workers along racial and ethnic lines by favoring one group over another increases as job opportunities decrease. But here we have blatant workplace crimes occurring at the height of a Manhattan construction boom! The sheer flagrancy of the violations indicates that the white business class feels neither shame, nor fear of prosecution.
“Worker insecurity has become a permanent condition of the American economy.”
There is something in the air, and it’s not the blooming of a new, “race-neutral” America. And the racial environment can only get worse as high unemployment becomes a permanent condition for workers of all races. The fact is, worker insecurity has become a permanent condition of the American economy – a direct and purposeful result of corporate domination of both major political parties. If the business class has its way, all workers will be made to feel insecure all of the time; management calls that a favorable business climate. In a political economy that is guided by the demands of business, job security has no place, and the whimseys and prejudices of management hold sway. If you give the bosses enough leeway, they'll bring back slavery.
Lawlessness runs amok throughout the corporate culture, which rewards the victimizing of others. A study released in early September showed that 68 percent of low-wage workers believe they were cheated out of money by their bosses at least once in the past week, with an average loss of 15 percent of their pay. Blacks are cheated three times as much as whites. Black women are robbed by their bosses more frequently than any other workers.
These are facts of life in the American workplace. A rising tide does not lift all boats. Judging by the crimes committed by employers during boom times, rising tides may even encourage employers to steal and discriminate with greater enthusiasm.
For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Glen Ford. On the web, go to www.BlackAgendaReport.com.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
 

 

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • BAR Book Forum: Alyosha Goldstein and Simón Ventura Trujillo’s book, “For Antifascist Futures”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Alyosha Goldstein and Simón Ventura Trujillo’s book, “For Antifascist Futures”
    31 Aug 2022
    This week’s featured authors are Alyosha Goldstein and Simón Ventura Trujillo. Goldstein is Professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico. Trujillo is Assistant Professor in the…
  • The “International Community” is an Unreliable Broker in Ethiopia Conflict
    Hermela Aregawi
    The “International Community” is an Unreliable Broker in Ethiopia Conflict
    31 Aug 2022
    The ongoing conflict in Ethiopia's Tigray region has been fueled by support from the United States. It is yet another proxy war which has brough great suffering to thousands of people.
  • 'You Can't Swim the Same River Twice': Why Full Employment Was a Great Idea, But is No More
    Jon Jeter
    'You Can't Swim the Same River Twice': Why Full Employment Was a Great Idea, But is No More
    31 Aug 2022
    Had it been fully implemented the Hawkins-Humphrey full employment bill would have been a boon to U.S. workers. Any talk of reviving it is now moot, as the industrial economy of the 1970s has been…
  •  Why Does the United States Continue to Occupy a Haitian Island?
    Melissa Béralus
    Why Does the United States Continue to Occupy a Haitian Island?
    31 Aug 2022
    The U.S. mined a million tons of guano on a Haitian island without paying a cent to the Haitian authorities. Other countries have sold the product for hundreds of millions of dollars.
  • Nehanda Abiodun and the Legacy of Resistance to the Prison Industrial Complex
    Abayomi Azikiwe
    Nehanda Abiodun and the Legacy of Resistance to the Prison Industrial Complex
    31 Aug 2022
    The late Nehanda Abiodun was an African American revolutionary who exemplified the movement to end national oppression and the criminalization of a people.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us