After 23 years working at UC’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, first as a bus driver and now as a groundskeeper, Kathreen Bedford was dismayed to learn a white man hired a couple years ago with whom she works side-by-side whacking weeds already makes a higher wage than she does.
“It’s hurtful,” said Bedford, 53, who is African-American and spent decades working in the University of California system to build up her wage from $13 an hour to $31. “I feel sad. I feel like the time hasn’t changed from when my mother was coming up, from when there was a colored-only water fountain and a white-only water fountain.”
A new report from AFSCME, the union that represents more than 25,000 low-wage UC workers like Bedford, suggests her situation is not unique. Women and people of color are often paid less for service jobs, such as groundskeeping or custodial work, than their white and male peers, according to the report — which is based on previously unpublished employment and demographic data the union asked for and got from UC. That’s also true for patient care workers, who assist nurses and take X-rays.
Among the latter group, starting wages for black women are 23 percent lower than starting wages for white men, which works out to a difference of around $16,000 a year. Among service workers, the difference is about 10 percent, or about $4,000.
“If I were UC and I saw what the data showed, I would make it a priority to examine and address these very stark patterns of racial and gender inequality,” said Owen Li, a senior researcher with the union and co-author of the report.
UC did not respond Monday to a request for comment.
“The UC has the potential to be an engine of equality for California and the nation,” said the board of directors for the Council of UC Faculty Associations, the umbrella organization representing campus faculty associations, in a statement. “Unfortunately, as this study shows, the university needs to address racial and gender disparities in pay within its ranks.”
The problem may not be limited to just UC.
“What we see within the UC system is true throughout California and throughout the nation in terms of low-wage workers being disadvantaged by the way in which the global economy is evolving,” said James Stewart, a professor emeritus of labor and employment relations at Penn State University who reviewed the report.
The report does not include information about workers’ education levels or employment history, which could affect how much people earn. But Li thinks much of the disparity is tied to UC outsourcing jobs that previously had been in-house.
According to the union, low-wage workers on the campuses who work for outside companies — which tend to pay lower wages and offer fewer benefits — are more likely to be black.
Data backs that up. According to the report, the share of African Americans employed by UC in service and patient-care work dropped by 37 percent from 1996 to 2015.
Bedford sees that figure in her daily work.
“I look around and I’m the only African-American woman,” she said. “We’re just being pushed down and pushed out.”
She was thrilled when she first found out the lab, owned by the University of California, was hiring. The single mom of two dreamed of making a good living and giving her son and daughter a chance to go to one of the system’s prestigious schools someday.
But those things didn’t happen. “I’m still waiting on that promise for a better future,” Bedford said.
Denise Dixon, an African-American hospital assistant at UC San Diego, knows the feeling.
“We’re not represented well at all,” said the 49-year-old mother of three, who has worked at UC checking in patients and verifying insurance information for 16 years.
Like Bedford, Dixon, who earns $26 an hour, works with a younger white man who has been there a short time and does similar work but earns slightly more.
“I think it’s a slap in the face, actually,” Dixon said.
The union did not respond to a question about exactly how much more the men earned. Stewart worries the disparities could get worse as baby boomers age and companies add low-wage healthcare workers amid intense pressure to cut costs.
The report calls for more oversight of UC, which operates relatively independently of state lawmakers, and limits on outsourcing jobs. Li would also like to see more training programs to create career ladders for people who start in low-wage jobs.
“Those things are not going to happen unless UC … commits to really getting to the bottom of and addressing these really stark racial and gender hierarchies,” Li said.
Bedford, who has two young granddaughters, isn’t holding her breath.
“I want them to have the opportunity to make a decent wage and to go to one of the UCs,” she said. “I’m scared that it’s not going to get any better.”
