Low-Wage Work

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The Labor Center conducts a wide range of research on low-wage work in California and nationally. Our research focuses on documenting and understanding working conditions in low-wage industries, especially for women, immigrants, and workers of color. We also analyze policies to raise labor standards at the local, state, and national levels.

For an in-depth description of California’s low-wage workforce, see our Data Explorer.

View our Inventory of US City and County Minimum Wage Ordinances.

You can also visit our Black Worker project.

Minimum wage, living wage, and other labor standards studies.

Research on the societal and fiscal costs of low-wage work.

In-depth studies of labor markets and working conditions in low-wage industries.

Research & Publications

Aida Farmand, Tynan Challenor, Savannah Hunter, Enrique Lopezliraand Ken Jacobs

State workers struggle to make ends meet throughout California; Women, Black, and Latino workers are disproportionately affected

The California state government has close to a quarter of a million employees, almost half of whom are women and almost two-thirds of whom are workers of color. But across occupations and throughout the state, many state workers earn well below what is needed to attain a decent standard of living in California.

Laurel Lucia

Many California family child care providers will now be better able to afford health care

This blog post outlines the assistance offered by the recently-established Child Care Providers United California Workers Health Care Fund, summarizes recent findings from a David Binder Research/ California Health Care Foundation survey that underscore the need for this new health care investment for family child care providers, and discusses how the program will improve affordability for providers and benefit California as a whole.

Press Coverage

NBC Bay Area

New Work From Home Data Shows Disparities

Enrique Lopezlira, the director of the Low-Wage Program at the UC Berkeley Labor Center, said that women and workers of color were affected more severely by the pandemic because they are overrepresented in industries that pay low wages, where they had to work on-site and risk their health during the pandemic.

Program Contacts

Enrique Lopezlira

Director, Low-Wage Work Program

Annette Bernhardt

Director, Technology and Work Program

Aida Farmand

Research and Policy Associate

Savannah Hunter

Research and Policy Associate

Seema Patel

Practitioner in Residence