Hourly wages in hospitals, nongovernmental (June 1963)

The following jobs in selected cities are similar to jobs in hotels, laundries, and restaurants which would be covered in H.R. 9824:

Weekly wages in nongovernmental hospitals, nurses aids, June 1963

This is the largest nonprofessional occupation that is peculiar to hospitals.

1 Includes full-time personnel and full-time equivalents of part-time personnel. Excludes residents interns, and students.

Includes full-time personnel and full-time equivalents of part-time personnel. Excludes residents, interns, and students.

Source: "Hospitals," Journal of the American Hospital Association, pt. 2, August 1963.

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. They deal with State minimum wages, and certain data with respect to hospital workers.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. I think they are important enough to have them printed in the record. Would you agree?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Yes; I would.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. Without objection, they will be included at the conclusion of the other testimony already accepted for the record. Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Thank you.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. Mr. Meiklejohn, let me ask you just two questions. There are certain claims that the type of worker who is generally employed in some of these industries is one who just can't be absorbed into normal occupational categories. In other words, that they are the handicapped, or the less developed or less educated than normally would be accepted into labor market, and that the result of bringing them under the coverage of the act would displace them and deny them the right or the opportunity of any kind of employment. Would you care to comment on that for the record?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Well, insofar as the actually handicapped worker, the man who is really and truly a handicapped worker, is concerned, as I think you know, there are provisions in the law under which less than the minimum wage may be paid to workers who are found by the Secretary to fall within that category.

We are not entirely satisfied with the standards that are presently applicable, because they have not as yet, we believe, been brought up date sufficiently, but they do provide a tolerance or a leeway where a worker is genuinely handicapped to enable him to work into the benefits of the act in an orderly way.

Insofar as you have problems with respect to other workers, just simply due to lack of education, lack of training, there is other legislation which this committee has considered, and which the Congress has passed, primarily designed to deal with this problem of lack of training, and we would hope that these programs could be intensified. Finally, it seems to us that whatever the situation may be with respect to these employees, the handicapped worker is in no less need of a subsistence level of living than any other worker. In fact, his needs may be greater, in order to overcome his handicap.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. I am glad you mentioned that last point. To give you a concrete example, suppose you have a dishwasher in a restaurant. Normally, dishwashers have been unskilled, usually of not too high educational standards, and the plea is that we will force them out of the labor market.

Now my own feeling is that if you don't do something about them, you simply perpetuate a known situation which is not healthy for either the economy or the society. It seems to me that one of the ways to attack this is to try to give them at least a minimum wage, and hopefully, a better one, so that they might have the incentive to improve themselves, rather than having been condemned to a situation which obviously is not dignified for a human being in our day and age.

Do you agree with that?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Yes; I think I would agree with that, and I would point out, too, a further fact. Just like the most skilled worker, these workers, too, are making their contribution, and are producing goods and services which go into the stream of commerce. In that sense, they are no different from any other worker.

It is very important that they have that basic floor, a basic platform, as we say in our statement, from which to start.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. I think it is interesting to point out that in discussing the war on poverty, and President Johnson's reference to a $3,000 a year income level, that even the minimum wage that we talk about here today doesn't raise the individual to that minimum poverty level.

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. That is right.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. So there is certainly nothing radical about this proposal. If anything, it is slightly-well, it is an improvement of something which perhaps needs to be improved even further.

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. As you know, we are also very strongly on record that the minimum wage, which is now at the top level of a dollar a quarter an hour, should be raised to at least $2 an hour at this time. The health of the economy demands it, and it is urgently in the interest of the low-paid workers.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. However, I think you would agree that the first priority at this time is the extension of coverage to the rest of the people.

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. I think we would agree on that; yes.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. One minor matter: Have you any information at all as to whether the Secretary or the Department or anybody has tried to find answers to the problem in the small logging area, where generally the attempt to dissuade us from including them has been on technical grounds, that it is impossible to keep the necessary records in order to enable the law to be enforced, that a logger will work off on his own, and no one knows when he is working and when he isn't working, and it is an impossible administrative job?

Have you any views on that, that you care to give us?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Well, I would point out, first, that these workers were covered for a fairly substantial period of time. They were eliminated from coverage under the act in 1949, under the amendments adopted at that time, when the minimum was raised to 75 cents an hour. Prior to that time, these workers had been covered and there had been no great difficulty in making determinations as to unpaid wages which were owing to them, and in keeping records for them. There was litigation on this in the courts, and I think this is a situation which has been somewhat exaggerated.

The larger establishments, which have workers working in the woods but on a larger scale than a 13-man group, keep records for these employees. I don't believe there really is a very serious problem for most of them, even the smallest ones.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. Thank you, sir.

Mr. Dent?

Mr. DENT. Sorry I was late, and I don't want to take any time, because I haven't heard the testimony, although I have hurriedly gone through it, and most of it is in line with what I would expect, coming from this source, and I have heard your arguments before, and your logic before.

There is one argument that has been made before this committee that if we pass a dollar and a quarter standard, and cover all of the industries that are asked for in the recommendations of the AFLCIO, that we negate all State laws, because we would then cover people in every line of endeavor on account of interpretation given to the interstate commerce laws.

I don't see that that is done, but do you have any comments on it? Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Well, we usually hear this argument when the question of extension of coverage is made, and I recall we had quite some discussion of this at the time when the act was extended in 1961. There is a large area, and there always will be a large area for State regulation of minimum wages and hours, even if all the workers who are not now covered and who legally could be covered under the Fair Labor Standards Act were brought under coverage.

This is because the reach of the commerce power is not quite as broad as many people think. There will always be a certai fair'y large area of local commerce; that is, intrastate commerce, which will not be within the reach of the commerce power as Congress deems it ought to be exercised.

Mr. DENT. Do you believe, then that the dollar volume ceiling or floor, as it were, is more or less a guarantee that there always will be need for local legislation?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Well, this is one way by which the cutoff could be made, yes; and this is, of course, the type of test that was used in 1961.

Mr. DENT. That is right.

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. To draw a line between covered and uncovered workers. Now this was not to be construed, and Congress itself in adopting those definitions did not mean to say, as we understand it, that a firm which did less than a million dollars might not be in interstate commerce or affect interstate commerce. It might, but they said at that time they didn't think this law ought to be applied to smaller establishments, even if they did affect commerce.

Mr. DENT. In other words, then, it is possible that a firm could clearly be under the interstate commerce provision, and yet not be subject to the Federal law, and would, therefore, be a proper subject for local or statewide legislation?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. That is right; let me point out, Congressman Dent, that there are some 1.2 million workers working in restaurants, of whom we are proposing coverage for some 400,000, which will leave a fairly substantial number not regulated by Federal law.

In the case of hotels, we are proposing the coverage of 274,000 out of 480,000, and in the case of laundries, 173,000 out of 575,000. If anything, our proposals here may be too modest, rather than extreme.

Mr. DENT. Do you have any figures on how many uncovered employees there are in America today?

Mr. OSWALD. Some 16,750,000 nonsupervisory, nongovernmental employees are not covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Mr. DENT. And you are asking for some 4-odd million at this time? Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. 4,600,000, yes.

Mr. DENT. Which are

Mr. Oswald. Of whom 2 million are covered by wage, but not by overtime.

Mr. DENT. Thank you. That is all I have at this time.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. Mr. Daniels?

Mr. DANIELS. No questions.

Mr. ROOSEVELT. Mr. Bell?

Mr. BELL. Mr. Meiklejohn, it is nice to have you here, and I am sorry I was a little late. I had a previous commitment that I had to make.

I just had a couple of questions, and I do not at all interpret this as being possible, I was just curious about this. It has come up several times in our other testimony, and I wondered if you had any answers to a problem that for most part runs through this whole area of restaurants, hotels, and motels. That is the tipping problem. Do you have any answers as to how that could be resolved?

Mr. MEIKLEJOHN. Well, as we have indicated in our statement, Congressman Bell, we are in favor of including employees who regularly receive tips under the minimum wage and overtime provisions, just as we are in favor of including other employees in the industries where you have this tipping situation.