Analysis of Low-wage workers in the United States.

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Low Income Wages in the United States
According to Churchill, Ehrenreich in her investigation on low wage workers states that low wage workers face many problems such as “many of the difficulties low wage workers face, include the hidden costs involved in such necessities as shelter (the poor often have to spend much more on daily hotel costs than they would pay to rent an apartment if they could afford the security deposit and first-and-last month fees) and food (e.g., the poor have to buy food that is both more expensive and less healthy than they would if they had access to refrigeration and appliances needed to cook”, 2001.
In the United States, most employees experience low wage problem. In as much as the unemployment rate is still low, most employers underpay their employees. A number of factors could explain why most people experience low wages. However, contrary to what most people think, low wage workers are not necessarily unskilled people. This is because, some of the positions these people hold require skills which they can only obtain in institutions. For example, when Ehrenreich was doing her investigations, one of the places she visited was hotels where she worked as a waitress. Despite the work being involving and requiring skills, she observed that the payments the waitresses received were low. As a result of this, most workers have to find other complimentary jobs during their free times, which are also very engaging and still pay low. As result, low wage workers could suffer from fatigue.
Some of the reasons why some workers are paid poorly could include the fact that no specific training or skills is required for that specific job. This however does not mean that the workers are not learned at all. For example, for people working as cleaning agents in an office may not get much pay because cleaning washrooms does not really require any skills. However, colleges and institutions that offer such short courses have come up and in most cases low wage workers are people have gained their skills through such short courses since in most cases they were unable to get access into good education system. It is therefore totally wrong to assume that low wage workers are unskilled people.
Most low wage workers always have bad experiences at their work place. This is because, most of their work involves their physical involvement such as mopping the floor, lifting of heavy boxes and carrying them from one point to the other, standing throughout out their entire working hours and having long working hours. This experiences are very unpleasant, especially followed by the fact that that they earn really low incomes.
Most employers pay low wages to their employees in order to keep their operational and their production costs on the minimum however, this does not guarantee high quality of work or services provided by the workers. This is because in most cases, they also work with low morale, and with no motivation, always looking out for better job opportunities out there. This translates to poor quality of work by the employees. Sometimes if employees could pay their workers good wages, it could be translated into high quality work being delivered to them. Other ways of motivating the workers to deliver good quality of work includes giving incentives to good performances. If employers could go an extra mile and pay more for their labor, most of the problems experienced at work could be minimized, especially the problem of low quality of work/products and also the problem of lack of self-motivation by employees.
Effects of low wages to workers
Some of the impacts of low wages to workers are discussed below:
1 Poor health.
Workers that have low wages could experience poor conditions. This could be caused by a number of factors such as not being able to access proper medical services because they may not be able to pay for health insurance. If workers could be able to pay for their health insurance, it means that they would frequent health checkups which means that any health problem could be detected early and given the right medical attention thus preventing effects of poor health such as absenteeism from work. Medical insurance also covers the whole family of the worker, thus the spouse and the children stand at a position to benefit good health services. However, most low-wage workers cannot afford to pay for medical insurance, therefore whenever they fall sick majority of them prefer to buy over the counter medicine because they cannot afford to visit proper medical centers due to high charges. In most cases, over the counter medicine could just solve their problem temporarily and in future serious cases could recur and cause cases of absenteeism from work as they try to seek better medical attention.
Poor health could also be caused by poor diet habits such as lack of a balanced diet because in most cases low wage workers cannot afford a proper meal. They may also lack the time needed for physical exercises which normally strengthens the body and makes the body a better immune system and also helps one to be physically fit. These workers may not afford to pay for extra activities such as gyms and swimming, which makes the human body more fit, and more relaxed. In addition, their houses will mainly not have room for such extra equipment such as gym equipment. They therefore could develop poor health conditions associated with lack of physical exercise.
2 Lack of family stability
In most cases, people who have low income may not have enough time to spend with their families, mainly their spouses and children. This is because they spend most of their free time doing other jobs that can boost their incomes. Thus they may experience family problems and mainly most of them face higher divorce rates than people who have high incomes. High income earners have enough time and money to spend in bonding activities with their families. In addition, children born in families that have low income wages may tend to suffer from loneliness. Secondly, low income workers may not afford to cater for housing expenses which are quite high in the United States. As a result, most of them end up staying with their relatives, in order to avoid expenses that could cost them a lot of money. It is unlikely for one to marry when they are not living independently, therefore most low wage workers end up being single all their life, and others end up marrying when they are really late. In some cases, these kind of workers will even co-habit with their friends who are as well low wage workers so that they can cost share their expenses. This means that they will both lack privacy and chances of getting their own families could be limited. Another factor that could prevent them from starting their own families is the stress and worry of whether they will be able to cater for family needs especially their children. The worry of whether they can afford the basic needs associated with having families could be a restraining factor.
3 Stress
In most cases, low wage workers suffer from stress. This could be as a result of living below the poverty line and not being able to afford their desired lifestyles. As a result, most of them suffer depression which one the other hand leads to poor performance of work at their places of work. In order to deal with stress, some people could develop behaviors such as smoking and drug addiction which eventually could affect their health negatively and cause problems such as drug dependency which on the long run could them drug related diseases such as lung cancer, throat cancer due to smoking of cigarettes and liver problems due to alcohol. Stress could a well make them to become anti-social, which means that their lives become lonely.
Stress could also make be the reason why majority of low wage workers refrain from starting their own families. This is because they may be worried if they will be able to afford good lives to their families. In most cases, the wags the wages they earn are not even enough for one person, leave alone their families.
4 Poor Education
Children born in families where parents earn low incomes may not get access to high quality education and thus they end up getting poor education. The quality of education offered in priva...