Hightower Lowdown

An independent study released by ACORN, a grassroots advocacy group for the working poor, finds that corporations enjoying fat, taxpayer-funded contracts from the U.S. government often pay poverty wages to the people actually doing the work. The feds, who set precise standards for the tensile strength of screws that the government buys, set no standards for the pay of people working under its contracts.

The study, conducted by the Economic Policy Institute, revealed that 11% of federal contract employees receive less than a "living wage," which is to say their paychecks are too low to lift them and their families above the poverty level.

In this period when federal contracts routinely cover the multimillion-dollar paychecks of the hoggish CEOs whose corporations get the contracts, it's appalling that our tax dollars would be used to subsidize sub-poverty pay.

Ironically, while the companies profit on the backs of these workers, many of the workers themselves have to turn to food stamps, housing assistance, and other federal poverty programs just to make ends meet. We taxpayers are hit with a double whammy: first, subsidizing low-wage companies, then providing services to assuage the poverty of their workers.

Better that the contractors be required to pay fair wages from the start, which is why the Living Wage Responsibility Act has been introduced in Congress, sponsored by Rep. Luis Guitierrez of Illinois. For more information, contact ACORN: 202-547- 2500.