Study Shows Construction Contractor CEO Pay Drops Dramatically in R-t-W States

For those of you living in states that are contemplating the enactment of a “Right-to-Work” law, you should download a new study that has some surprising conclusions.
This study, which was released today, concludes that construction contractor CEO income falls dramatically in states that adopt “Right-to-Work” (RTW) laws!
That’s right. Construction contractor CEO incomes fall precipitously when RTW laws are enacted.
Authored by Frank Manzo of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI) and Bob Bruno of the University of Illinois, the study, titled Which Labor Market Institutions Reduce Income Inequality? Labor Unions, Prevailing Wage Laws, and Right-to-Work Laws in the Construction Industry, also finds that prevailing wage laws did a good job matching common construction rates with the actual market price of labor, and increasing worker incomes by just 1.2 percent.
On the other hand, they have no negative effect on the total incomes of contractor CEOs. Prevailing wage laws, the data show, reduce income inequality between the highest earners and the lowest earners of the construction industry by 45.1 percent.
These conclusions support and build upon prior research by ILEPI and the University of Illinois, which found that repealing Illinois’ prevailing wage law would cost the state a 3,300 net loss of jobs, a $365 million decline in construction worker earnings, an annual contraction of more than $1 billion in the state’s gross domestic product, and a combined $160 million lost in state, local, and federal tax revenues. The study also found that prevailing wage laws support construction apprenticeship programs, with participation rates that are 1.7 to 1.9 times those of states without prevailing wage laws.
Co-author Bruno noted in a recent news article that “a policy like the prevailing wage law is one of those safeguards that protects Illinois’ economy and workplace. Any efforts to change, alter, or weaken it would put one of the most important pillars of a middle-class economy in the state at risk.”
Conversely, right-to-work laws reduce the incomes of both construction workers and contractor CEOs.

More From IUOE Local 370: