Toronto should pay every city worker a living wage
Over the winter, a small group quietly deliberated over a basic question: What does it take for a family to make ends meet in Toronto?
The group — which consisted of researchers, social justice and workers’ rights advocates, employers and labour — came together to calculate Toronto’s living wage for 2015.
A living wage is different from the legally mandated provincial minimum wage. It reflects the minimum of what it takes to raise a family in this city.
There’s rent, one of the biggest expenses any Toronto family faces: rent here is among the most expensive in Canada. We’ve calculated the cost of a two-bedroom apartment, though parents know three bedrooms are preferred.
There’s child care. While the city offers subsidized quality child care to lowerincome families, the wait-list is in the tens of thousands.
In the absence of enough affordable public child care in Toronto, the next cheapest option is home-based child care, which is often unregulated and not always parents’ first choice. It still costs our composite family, consisting of a 3year-old and a 7-year-old, $16,999.45 a year.
Working parents need to get to work, and purchase groceries, clothing and footwear. Household costs — such as laundry and hydro — are not negotiable.
Add tenant insurance, basic household items and furniture, a cellphone, Internet, school supplies and life adds up in a hurry.
When you factor in these basic needs, two working parents need to work full time and earn $18.52 an hour in order to make ends meet in Toronto.
With Ontario’s legally mandated minimum wage at $11 an hour, it’s no wonder that there are so many working poor. Many face the added challenge of working one or several precarious jobs where the hours may be unpredictable or part time.
The city of Toronto could take a leadership role in creating good, stable jobs for all Torontonians.
As a champion of quality jobs for all, city council could model this commitment by passing a motion that ensures total compensation of all workers, both direct and indirect employees, is at least $18.52 an hour.
Stable jobs that pay a living wage would be a real game-changer.
It would help counter the growing divide between the rich and the rest of us that threatens the well-being of our community. Others have done it and are reaping the benefits.
In the U.K., the Greater London Authority championed a living wage and now over 1,200 employers have committed to the idea. New York’s mayor has expanded that city’s living wage requirement to cover thousands more workers.
In Hamilton, the public school board has committed to becoming a living wage employer and the city of Hamilton is examining it.
In Waterloo Region, there is an active employer recognition program with a growing list of living-wage champions.
Paying a living wage can be great for business. Research shows employers who pay a higher wage experience reduced staff turnover, improved productivity and better customer service. Organizations that adopt a living-wage pay structure often attract customers who want to reward a model employer.
So it makes sense that the Windsor Chamber of Commerce is a partner in that community’s living wage campaign and that in Toronto, DUCA Credit Union is becoming a living wage employer and championing the idea to others.
We understand that for many employers, including the city of Toronto, implementing a living wage of $18.52 can’t happen overnight.
Yet if we don’t have a plan that takes us there, rewarding workers and employers along the way, it won’t happen at all.
Like London and New York, the city of Toronto has a responsibility — and an opportunity — to be a model employer and to leverage the billions it spends every year on contracts to encourage other employers to do the same.
This is a message Toronto’s city council needs to consider as it develops an antipoverty strategy. Stable jobs with a living wage aren’t the whole answer, but it should be a part of the package.