Wages

First of three parts Tiffany Lee wanted a car. She was weary of the two-hour bus ride to her job at a UCLA Health System clinic. She hated having to ask friends to drive her 7-year-old son to his asthma treatments. But as a single mother with three children, bad credit and a $27,000-a-year salary, she couldn't find a bank or dealership willing to give her a loan. Then a friend steered her to Repossess Auto Sales in Hawthorne. Another buyer might have balked at the deal she was offered.

That ray of light you see peeking through all the clouds darkening California's future? That's the sun. More specifically, solar power, in which California is the hands-down national leader. The state's installed solar generating capacity of about 1.2 gigawatts - the equivalent of two big conventional power plants and enough to fill the electrical demand from nearly 200,000 homes for a year - easily outstrips the next 10 highest-ranked states. It's also the fastest-growing solar market in the country.

The newest slumlord in Los Angeles is a pillar of German capitalism. Earlier this month, the city attorney's office filed suit against Deutsche Bank, the world's fourth-largest bank, for letting many of the more than 2,000 L.A. homes it has foreclosed on descend into squalor and decay. A yearlong city investigation of the properties on which Deutsche Bank foreclosed turned up tenants compelled to live in crumbling apartments the bank would not fix, houses taken over by gangs, faucets from which water either wouldn't flow or wouldn't stop, and the occasional unidentified dead body.

Peter Fuller, who never fully accepted the ruling that stripped the 1968 Kentucky Derby crown from his thoroughbred Dancer's Image, died Monday of cancer at a skilled-care facility in Portsmouth, N.H., his family said. He was 89. In May 1968, Dancer's Image rallied from last place in a field of 14 to win the Derby by a length and a half. Days later, traces of the drug phenylbutazone were found in the horse's post-race urinalysis, and the colt was disqualified. The medication is commonly used to alleviate chronic pain and joint soreness, not to enhance performance.

Tangela Ridgeway agrees that the economy is improving. It's just the pay that's getting worse. The 36-year-old mother of three used to make $18.75 an hour as a front desk agent at a Hollywood hotel. Now, she says, similar positions are listed at $14 an hour. She's living with siblings in Cerritos, trying to save money as she watches prices rise for milk, cereal, eggs and gas. She worries that she's going to need two full-time jobs to make ends meet, but would settle for one, even if it pays less.

Your article on the minimum wage was very interesting. We heard the same arguments against it, when the 25-cent hour minimum wage was passed. I believe it is true, that often, when wages go up, prices go up, which maintains the same level of "real wages" even though the "money wages" are increased. One way to overcome this is to encourage or require the employer to pay more fringe benefits, such as vacations with pay, paid sick leave, health and dental insurance or the same amount of wages for less hours.

Now that Jim and Tammy Bakker have discovered and latched onto the "976" telephonic-tape gold mine with an estimated possible daily take of up to $100,000 it may be necessary to revise the Biblical observation that "the wages of sin is $$$$$." NORM HASS Los Angeles

"L.A. County Jobs Surge Since '93, but Not Wages" (July 26) blows the smoke screen on the "booming economy." While corporate America with its multimillionaire CEOs reaps huge profits, very little has trickled to the average working person. As the high-paying jobs have left to offshore companies, American workers have been marginalized. Altering time cards by supervisors is all too common, as well as reclassifying once full-time employees as temps, part-time or "independent contractors."

Cardinal Roger Mahony (Commentary, Nov. 3) writes that over the last 10 years the benefits of economic growth are enjoyed by fewer persons and that real wages have fallen. In fact, total employment rose by 17 million persons in this period, unemployment fell from 7.1% to 5.5%, and real wages rose. Labor compensation increased by $1.8 trillion, showing the same percentage increase as national income. Mahony is correct, however, in stating that much more needs to be done to prevent families from falling into the poverty class.

Instead of advocating wages for housework, Margaret Prescod and Phoebe Jones-Schellenberg (Op-Ed Page, June 16) would do better if they concentrated their efforts on increasing the education and training aspects of the proposed workfare legislation. In demanding that we legislate their morality, they do women a great disservice because they fail to deal with reality and encourage women to remain dependent. Unfortunately, this country does not place a high value on the work women do in the home.

Perhaps the only silver lining to the Great Recession is that it triggered a new focus on manufacturing in the United States. After 25 years of being sold a shiny vision of a service-dominated post-industrial economy, the U.S. is rediscovering how important it is to actually make things in order to spur innovation, raise wages, drive exports and lower the trade deficit. Corporate cost calculations undergird the newfound appreciation of U.S. manufacturing. The offshoring of manufacturing was rooted in harsh economic realities: rock-bottom wages in nations such as China and the aggressive attraction and infrastructure strategies of foreign governments.

PARIS - It was billed as a political duel to the death. In the right corner, Nicolas Sarkozy, incumbent president seeking reelection but trailing badly in opinion polls. In the left, Socialist challenger Francois Hollande, favored to winFrance's presidential runoff Sunday but facing an aggressive rival with nothing to lose. The pair's only live television debate, it had been described by Sarkozy as "the moment of truth. " And, as possibly his last chance to turn his fortunes around, Sarkozy had vowed to "explode" his rival.

WASHINGTON -- Men continue to take a bigger hit in their paychecks than women because of lingering effects of the Great Recession, according to a study by the Conference Board. Average wages for women remain lower than those for their male counterparts, by nearly 20%. But men's wages have been much slower to rebound from the effects of the recession, which had its most severe impact on male-dominated industries, such as construction, the study found. Although the recession technically ended in 2009, men's wage growth had rebounded to half the average rate of the previous decade by last year.

The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and the major studios have reached a tentative agreement on a new contract that averts a potential showdown. The so-called basic agreement covers about 35,000 members who belong to IATSE's Hollywood locals and includes camera operators, set decorators, grips and others who work behind the scenes on movies and TV shows. Under the proposed deal reached late last night, IATSE members would receive a 2% annual wage increase over three years — in line with raises negotiated by other entertainment unions.

HUIZHOU, China — Tony Zhang used to make cents on the dollar churning out cheap sneakers for Wal-Mart. And like every other low-margin exporter in China's manufacturing heartland, he was struggling to keep pace with rising costs for labor and raw materials. Rather than run his business into the ground with ever-shrinking profits, the Taiwan-born Zhang decided to upgrade his operations. His factory just outside Shenzhen now makes specialty footwear, including fire retardant boots, steel-toed shoes and soccer cleats.

Everyone says there's a class war going on in the United States. If so, it is, at least so far, a war of words. It's also a war in which a principal tactic is accusing the other side of fighting a class war while denying that you're fighting one yourself. Meanwhile, everybody claims to be on the same side: the side of the people, against the aristocratic elitist snobs who … where did I park my tumbrel? In this war of words, certain words take on a special weight or meaning.

The argument over taxes becomes a moot question. It never is brought up that taxes are unwittingly or perhaps even intentionally factored into wages. If taxes were to be eliminated, eventually wages and income would reduce themselves to levels approximating the present amounts after taxes. JOE R. TOLOSA JR. Glendora

California labor regulators have settled a lawsuit with a bankrupt title insurance company, recovering $4.29 million in back wages for 633 employees who were laid off in 2008. Denver-based Mercury Cos. abruptly closed the doors of affiliates operating in California and failed to pay workers wages, vested vacation benefits, commissions, expenses and notary fees, the state had contended. "In this case, a company closed without providing the proper notification and without paying final wages as required by law and was found to owe over $4 million in back wages," state Labor Commissioner Angela Bradstreet said.

WASHINGTON -- Mitt Romney, speaking on the same stage that President Obama used a day earlier to launch a blistering attack on the GOP, returned fire by accusing the president of "rhetorical excess" and using "straw men to distract from his record. " The former Massachusetts governor, one day after winning a set of primaries that all but ensured he would be his party's nominee to face Obama in the fall, also used the week-old "hot mic" incident involving the president and his Russian counterpart to raise questions about what Obama would do if he wins a second term.

The Los Angeles City Council is considering granting economic incentives to the local hotel industry to encourage modernization projects and better pay for workers. In a motion introduced on Tuesday, the council agreed to ask several city departments for reports on how "public benefits" and other incentives could be used to help strengthen the local tourism industry, which the motion said is "lagging behind where it can be. " Hotels, the measure said, are aging and falling behind in energy efficiency, and hotel workers are largely "underpaid and overworked.