Taxpayers Oppose 'Charity' Wages for Street Cleaners
A reform group challenges the city's plan to pay men $1.25 a day for street cleaning, arguing the city is exploiting laborers under the guise of charity.
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A protest on behalf of the Taxpayers' Reform Association, signed by Robert Bridges, O. C. Whitney, and S. B. Harben has been sent to the city council, against allowing street cleaning to be done under the direction of the Bureau of Associated Charities. They base their objection upon the charter, which requires all such work to be done under the direction of the street superintendent, and on the broader ground that it is taking advantage of men's necessities to ask them to work for so small a sum as $1.25 a day. They say that if a man gives the city labor for less than he is entitled to get for it, he is the donor and not the recipient of charity.
“If a man gives the city labor for less than he is entitled to get for it, he is the donor and not the recipient of charity.”
This 1894 debate echoes contemporary debates about the use of temporary or 'volunteer' labor for municipal services versus providing living-wage jobs. The argument that 'charity' shouldn't come at the expense of fair market wages remains a fundamental civic tension.
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