It goes without saying that those of us working all over Waukegan are doing so at poverty wages. A living wage calculator states that unless you are an engineer, business owner, computer scientist, doctor, lawyer, or manager, you are not making enough to support yourself and one child in a 40 hour week. In Waukegan, of course, this group of professionals is tiny compared to those of us working in the factories, fields, and service industries.

A living wage tallies up all the money one needs to pay for rent, food, bills, health care, transportation, and a small amount allotted for leisure. Our average hourly pay comes nowhere near this number, and the minimum wage is anywhere from 2 to 8 times less than a living wage. These numbers are based on the 40-hour work week, something which is rapidly disappearing in our industries. Because of this, it is necessary for an explicitly working-class organization to fight for a living wage for all people.

When it comes to an idea like the living wage, anarchists must take the humanism from the Left with the realism from the Right. Of course, we are humanists who see things like health care and food as human rights, and we agree with the Left on this. We can't have faith that capitalism will provide us with the things we need in life after this many years of abuse. However, conservatives are correct when they point out the negative effects of the living wage. Employers are less likely to hire new people if the wages are so high; they will also decrease the hours for everyone at the first sign of economic instability. Living wages will also no doubt increase inflation, and the cost of living will skyrocket. To the unemployed and those working under the living wages, this is disastrous. How do we, as anarchists, take in both of these views and apply them to our own organizations?

To stop the employers from dropping hours or refusing to hire new people, unions must state within their contracts an end to hiring freezes and a minimum of 35 hours a week (if not 40). This should be put into place well before a living wage campaign so that the employers have nothing to fall back upon. As long as workers are guaranteed hours, the manager is unable to use that economic weapon against us.

As we organize and spread our own ideas, it will become quickly apparent to people that capitalism simply cannot provide for the working class. A living wage is necessary for all, but it simply does not work. The overhead costs (the cost to make a good) combined with the boss' profit will always keep working people from achieving a descent standard of living. We do not have an answer on how to curb inflation within capitalism while struggling for workers' rights. Therefore the working class would begin to understand that a living wage cannot exist under the current system, and the idea of wages in general is fundamentally flawed.

There will be a tendency to stay reformist, or to only fight towards the living wage. The living wage is not an end in itself. Rather, it is a way to empower the working-class to see its own power, to educate the workers on how to continue to organize after the fight, and to secure better living standards for all of us. The anarchist organization shows its strength here through constant agitation and education of the movement. At every turn the workers must realize that they can never achieve real gains under the current system. Anarchists are also important in pointing out the class conflict which has existed and will escalate as workers are organized. The anarchist organization's job is to pull the class war out of the shadows and expose managers for what they are at every stage in the labor movement. Through this movement the workers' can create unions which will not only secure their rights but also be the basis for an egalitarian society.

Remember: The working class and the employing class have nothing in common!

To find the calculations for the living wage in Waukegan and elsewhere visit:
http://www.livingwage.geog.psu.edu/results.php?location=10634