TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas legislators are considering a proposal that many disability rights advocates say would encourage employers to keep paying disabled workers less than the minimum wage, bucking a national trend.
A Kansas House bill would expand a state income tax credit for goods and services purchased from vendors employing disabled workers, doubling the total allowed to $10 million annually. A committee approved it Monday, sending it to the full House for debate, possibly later this week.
Vendors qualify now by paying all of their disabled workers at least the minimum wage, but the measure would allow vendors to pay some workers less if those workers aren’t involved in purchases of goods and services to earn the tax credit. Supporters argue the bill would enable more vendors to participate, boosting job and vocational training opportunities for disabled people.
The Kansas debate comes as employers nationally have moved toward paying at least the federal hourly minimum wage of $7.25. About 122,000 disabled workers received less in 2019, compared to about 295,000 in 2010, according to a U.S. Government Accountability Office report to Congress in January.
Critics argue that below-minimum-wage jobs exploit workers such as Trey Lockwood, a 30-year-old Kansas City-area resident with autism, who holds down three part-time jobs paying more than the minimum wage. At one of them, The Golden Scoop ice cream shop, he greets customers and makes ice cream with a “spinner,” a machine he said is like a washing machine. He has money to buy clothes and other things.
“I feel good about that,” he said.
His mother, Michele Lockwood, said employers who pay less than the minimum wage aren’t fostering independence.
Neil Romano, a member of the National Council on Disability, agreed, adding, “It is very much against the flow of history.”
But other advocates and operators of programs questioned about their wages said the severity of some physical, intellectual and mental disabilities mean such programs can’t be eliminated without depriving people of valuable opportunities.
Cottonwood Inc., in Lawrence in northeastern Kansas, handles packaging for some companies. Its wages are based on the prevailing industry standard in the area of more than $15 an hour, adjusted for a worker’s productivity. As workers get more productive, they earn higher pay.
CEO Colleen Himmelberg said Cottonwood helps workers who need one-on-one support that other employers won’t provide.
“They’re likely not going to help someone toilet or clean up an accident. There’s the reality,” Himmelberg said. “But that person can work here and still earn a paycheck.”
Pat Jonas, president and CEO of the Cerebral Palsy Research Foundation in Wichita, Kansas, said the goal is a more “user friendly” tax credit program shorn of a big burden for some vendors. If employers currently want to participate, while also maintaining below-minimum-wage jobs as vocational training, they must set up a new, separate company or nonprofit paying workers at or above the minimum wage.
“It’s just sad that everyone can’t be pulling in the same direction,” Jonas said, adding that the foundation has always paid at or above the minimum wage.
Thirteen states bar below-minimum-wage jobs for disabled workers, including California, Colorado and Tennessee, according to the Association of People Supporting Employment First, which promotes inclusive job policies. Virginia lawmakers sent a bill last month to Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, and there’s a bipartisan proposal for a national ban in Congress.
Andy Traub, a Kansas City-area human resources consultant who works with The Golden Scoop and much larger businesses, said there might be a limited place for sheltered workshops, but “not as a default setting.” Groups serving the disabled ought to be required to help them try “competitive” jobs first, he said.
The federal law allowing an exemption from paying the minimum wage dates to the 1930s. It is based on the premise that a lower wage offsets an assumed lower productivity among disabled workers and exempted employers must regularly study how quickly employees do their work. The January report to Congress said 51% of exempted employers’ disabled workers make less than $3.50 per hour and close to 2% earn less than 25 cents hourly.
