Bridging a wage gap

To compete with McDonald’s for workers, Kelly Minor raised the starting wage at Zip’s Drive-in in Coeur d’Alene to $6.50 per hour, adding a 50 cent raise after 30 days.

He still has trouble finding people willing to don Zip’s signature red T-shirts and hold down shifts in the 50s-style burger joint. A booming local job market has created intense competition for entry-level workers.

“We quit paying $5.15 two or three years ago,” said Minor, who owns the Zip’s on Government Way and one in Moscow, Idaho. “Even high school kids wouldn’t work for that.”

Idaho is one of 21 states where the minimum wage matches the federal level of $5.15 per hour. Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a measure that would raise the federal minimum wage to $5.85 per hour within 60 days of being signed into law. If the measure wins U.S. Senate support and becomes law, minimum wage would rise to $6.55 per hour one year later and to $7.25 after two years.

Few North Idaho employers, however, are likely to feel pinched by a minimum wage increase. Like Minor, they’ve already raised their wages.

Three years of strong job growth in the Idaho Panhandle has led to historic low unemployment rates of 4 percent. Demand for entry-level workers has increased pay for retail clerks, landscape laborers, hotel maids and call center agents, said Kathryn Tacke, regional economist for Idaho’s Commerce & Labor Department.

Many people are surprised to see fast-food restaurants advertising for workers at $7 to $8.50 per hour, she said. But in today’s labor market, “you won’t find many jobs paying $5.15 per hour,” Tacke said.

The exception is waiters and waitresses, who make up the bulk of the 7,700 North Idaho residents who still earn less than $6 per hour. Federal law allows waiters and waitresses to be paid $3.35 per hour if their tips bring their overall earnings to at least minimum wage.

The short commute to Washington has also raised entry-level wages. Eight years ago, Washington voters approved an initiative pegging their state’s minimum wage to the cost of living. Washington state now has the nation’s highest minimum wage – $7.93 per hour.

Minor has adjusted wages accordingly at the Zip’s he owns in Moscow, Idaho. Since the restaurant is just 8 miles from Pullman, Wash., he’s raised starting wages to $7, with a 50-cent increase after 30 days.

“It’s still very hard to get workers,” said Minor, a 25-year veteran of the fast-food industry. Even Minor’s best workers seldom stay at Zip’s for more than six to eight months.

Silverwood Theme Park faces similar challenges. The park is one of North Idaho’s largest seasonal employers, hiring nearly 800 people each summer to act as cashiers, cooks, lifeguards and groundskeepers. The park recruits heavily from the high school and college crowd.

Last year, the park increased entry level pay from $5.25 to $6.25 per hour to compete with other employers. “We’re going to do it again this year,” said Nancy DiGiammaro, Silverwood’s marketing director.

At job fairs starting in March, Silverwood will advertise $7 wages for beginning positions for youth 16 and older. The park also offers retention bonuses, so those workers could be earning $8 per hour if they stay through Labor Day, according to DiGiammarco.

Advocates for higher wages, meanwhile, note that jobs paying $7 to $9 per hour still fall short of a living wage. In Idaho, a single adult needs to earn $10.41 per hour, or $21,658 annually, to provide for basic needs, according to the 2006 Northwest Job Gap study, an annual assessment of the cost-of-living in four Northwest states.

The $10.41 per hour figure is based on a monthly budget that includes $492 for rent and utilities, $163 for food, $361 for transportation and $154 for savings.

A single adult with a child needs to earn $17.89 per hour, or $37,219 annually, to meet basic needs, according to the study.

Even with the recent growth in pay, North Idaho seems like a low-wage area to Gloria Wurm, who moved to Hayden from Houston four years ago. The former credit and collections supervisor was earning $35 per hour working at an environmental firm in Texas. She looked into temporary jobs in North Idaho, but decided to retire instead.

“I was willing to work for $12 to $15 per hour,” Wurm said. “At $7, it wasn’t worth it.”

David Gray Remington, a retired librarian, is among the thousands of Idaho workers who could benefit from a two-year phase in of a higher federal minimum wage. He earns $6.50 per hour working part-time with the University of Idaho’s research map collection, cataloging and repairing rare maps that date back to pre-statehood days.

Remington, 69, likes the work. The income also supplements his pension and Social Security checks.

But he calls the minimum wage debate a “political hobby horse … I think there’s a larger context,” he said.

Offering entry-level workers more training so they can advance to higher paying jobs is a surer path out of poverty, Remington said.