Findings & Recommendations
Our exploratory findings suggest that rent burden persists among Seattle low-wage workers, despite some improvements after the increase in the minimum wage. The greater proportion of non low-wage workers moving into Seattle in contrast to low-wage workers moving out of the city and into the outskirts highlights these workers are likely being displaced. Thus, The $15 minimum wage increase appears to be helpful for some but insufficient for many. Comprehensive measures, such as investing in more affordable housing in conjunction with raising renters’ income, should be considered to meaningfully address the dual crises of housing and income inequity.
Future Considerations
Research
Future researchers should consider furthering our exploratory analyses with predictive or inferential modeling. For example, future research may include examining the minimum wage increase effect on people’s varying modes of transportation commuting patterns. Additionally, WMLAD can be used to understand the intersection of the minimum wage increase and health disparities. Refining metrics such as developing a displacement index or stratifying by multiple wage categories (e.g., low, medium, high) can assist in identifying more nuanced results.
Investigating racial disparities may help understand whether the minimum wage improved workers’ well-being. Future researchers should build cohorts to follow and assess longitudinal change over time. Lastly, researchers should also consider approaches for estimating people’s real wage (accounting for their cost of living) rather than their discrete wage amount itself.
Washington Merged Longitudinal Administrative Data (WMLAD)
WMLAD represents a unique administrative dataset with rich longitudinal data, including geocoded points that allows researchers to look at geospatial patterns at varying geographical units (e.g., block, tract, county). Importantly–administrative data–while not traditionally used for research purposes, can be leveraged to probe the effects of policy changes such as the $15 minimum wage ordinance. While there is still much work to be done to examine past impacts of the wage change before 2017, there are exciting possibilities to extend this investigation to make predictions for the future. Given the novel nature of WMLAD and its rich sampling depth, we believe there should be continued efforts to invest in its development and maintenance.