Low-Wage Workers Make Up 31% of NYC Workforce

From the Center for an Urban Future

Low-Wage Jobs

This edition of New York by the Numbers shows that low- wage workers make up 31 percent of the city's adult workforce. The Bronx has the highest share of low-wage workers (42 percent), but Queens (with 34 percent of the adult workforce in low-wage positions) and Brooklyn (32 percent) aren't too far behind. The share of low-wage workers—as we define it, those making less than $11.54 an hour or $24,003 a year—is slightly lower in Staten Island (23 percent) and Manhattan (22 percent).

According to the analysis, the alarmingly high number of low-wage workers in the Bronx helps explain why Bronx residents and politicians recently opposed a plan for a new shopping mall at the Kingsbridge Armory that did not guarantee living wages to retail workers there.

Click here to read the study.

Posted by Chuck Bell at 1:19 PM