Let’s Talk About Wages (The Second Tension)

In my previous article on the state of equine related labor, I wrote “Let’s come right out and say it, the equine industry is not known for great wages, actually quite the opposite. This is not the time to debate why and if that should be the case, suffice to say that it is”. Well, now is both the time and the place to talk about wages in the horse industry.

I think we should start with what a sustainable wage is, what it means, and why it’s important. To me, a sustainable wage is not the minimum wage. The minimum wage is a legal constraint on the minimum someone can legally be paid, not the minimum someone can live on. A sustainable wage is the wage needed for someone to provide themselves and their family with steady housing, nutrition and the basic needs of a modern family. There is actually a term and a calculation for this: a living wage. A living wage is geographically specific and accounts for food, childcare, health insurance, housing, transportation and personal care items. What it doesn’t take into account are luxuries such as eating at restaurants, any kind of entertainment, or any paid time off. So these rates are calculated for one or two adults working 40 hours per week, 52 weeks a year. Also, of significance is the fact that the living wage is calculated to meet needs on a day-to-day basis, with no financial cushion to fall back on in the future. It does not take into account any “extra” financial means to enable savings or investment of any kind. In fact, “the living wage is the minimum income standard that, if met, draws a very fine line between the financial independence of the working poor and the need to seek out public assistance or suffer consistent and severe housing and food insecurity”. (Living Wage Calculator)

Let’s take a look at what a living wage means in real life. Just for the purposes of illustration I will take examples from the most expensive state in the contiguous U.S. (New York) and the least expensive state in the contiguous U.S. (Mississippi). In New York State, the living wage for a single adult with no children is $18.62 an hour, and the living wage for a household of two working adults with two children is $24.66 per hour per adult. On the other hand, the average “horse farm” hourly wage for New York State is $14, as compiled by ZipRecruiter. I just want everyone to soak in that wage disparity for one moment. That’s more than four dollars an hour less than the living wage for a single person, and TEN dollars an hour less than what someone with a family would need to earn. In Mississippi, the living wage for a single adult with no children is $13.43 an hour, and the living wage for a household of two working adults with two children is $18.07 per hour per adult. On the other hand, the average “horse farm” hourly wage for Mississippi is $12.30, as compiled by ZipRecruiter. Again we see wage disparity here, however the gap between the average and living wage is lessened.

This is important because it gives us another lens through which to see the employment problem. The question becomes not just “Does the equine industry offer competitive wages?”, but “Does the equine industry offer sustainable wages?” Even if the industry isn’t offering competitive wages, there are still people out there who really love this kind of work. These are people who will opt to work an equine job, even if it pays less than other jobs, simply because they love it. If, however, the industry cannot offer sustainable wages, then the outlook is quite different. If most people cannot realistically pay for their basic necessities based on the average wage offered by the average job in the industry, they will be forced into the general labor market. Now, I say “average wage” and “average job”, because I know there are equine jobs out there that offer wages that are both competitive and sustainable. The problem is those jobs are few and far enough between that people get discouraged from even looking for them, thus shrinking the potential work force even further. In short, rising wages in other sectors of the economy, higher prices in general from rising inflation, and the lack response in much of the equine industry, is pushing more and more workers out of the equine industry.

So there you have it, why wages are such an important part of the employment issue. I have, however, left something very important out. So far I have really only focused on the employee side of the equation, with a heavy dose of pessimism as to why some parts of the industry are slipping. I know the solutions to problems are never one sided, just as the problems themselves are not one sided. First and foremost, I wanted to explore the issues affecting employees, mostly to dispel the all too common phrase “No one wants to work anymore”. With more understanding growing around the pressures on employees, I will next turn to the pressures and issues growing on the employer side of this labor equation. Only by looking at both sides of the difficulty of hiring and retaining good, qualified employees can we begin to craft solutions.