Heated debate over whether Calif.’s prevailing wage requirement stymies affordable housing

As a shortage of affordable housing plagues California, the state’s mandates that developers pay prevailing wage on most taxpayer-subsidized low-income housing projects are a source of contentious debate.

The cost of constructing low-income housing in California now averages $332,000 per unit. In an effort to determine the causes of high price tags on these projects, in 2014 the state released a report that officially said the impact of prevailing wage couldn’t be determined.

But one of the consultants hired to do the study says that projects that paid prevailing wage were 11% more expensive to build. Labor economists were able to convince the state of enough uncertainties in the prevailing wage analysis so that the study didn’t reach a firm conclusion on the issue, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The prevailing wage requirement continues to have strong support in the state legislature. Governor Jerry Brown’s housing plan failed last year in large part because of the Building Trades’ opposition to a relaxation of prevailing wage requirements, the Times says. This year, legislators have introduced more limited versions of Brown’s proposal that include prevailing wage requirements.

New York City has two very large buildings dedicated to answering the 911 calls of its five boroughs. With more than 11 million emergency calls annually, it makes perfect sense. The second of these buildings, the Public Safety Answering Center II (PSAC II) is located on a nine-acre parcel of land in the Bronx. It’s an imposing 450,000 square-foot structure—a 240-foot-wide by 240-foot-tall cube. The gleaming aluminum cube risesthe equivalent of 24 stories from behind a grassy berm, projecting the unlikely impression that it might actually be floating. Like most visually striking structures, the building has drawn as much scorn as it has admiration.