Zoey Freedman: Raising minimum wage not enough to meet high LA housing costs

Although some L.A. residents’ paychecks may be growing in size over the next five years, it may not end up making the kind of difference they need.

On May 19, the Los Angeles City Council voted in favor of raising the minimum wage from the current $9 an hour to $15 an hour by 2020, increasing it in increments over the next five years. Although $15 is a significant increase from the current measly $9 an hour, it still is not a wage high enough to make life in Los Angeles affordable for many people.

That’s why UCLA, and the students that go here, should not take the minimum wage increase as the end of the battle of affordability. Housing prices in Los Angeles are so high that even with the full increase, this city remains an unaffordable place to live for many families and individuals – including students and recent graduates.

UCLA plans to increase student wages in small increments to correlate with Los Angeles’ rising minimum wage, which will be an improvement to the close-to-minimum wage that student workers are currently paid.

But concerns about minimum wage should be secondary if housing is completely unaffordable to begin with. UCLA students, with the help of the Undergraduate Students Association Council, need to use the resources afforded to them through the university to lobby city officials now for a smart growth plan to make housing more affordable not only for themselves post-graduation but for all other residents.

Although L.A. housing problems may seem irrelevant to students who live on campus or in some of the cheaper Westwood apartments, about 40 percent of UCLA alumni remain in the Los Angeles area after graduation, making affordable housing a very real issue after graduation, especially when coupled with piles of student debt.

A recent study showed that even the expected $15 hourly minimum wage is still not enough to live in any part of Los Angeles. Even if minimum wage continues to rise, it won’t necessarily increase enough to allow L.A. residents to comfortably afford the city’s steep housing and rent prices.

If life isn’t affordable now even with the expected increase, it can’t be expected to be affordable in 2020 when the full minimum wage hike goes into effect, especially if Los Angeles doesn’t create a concrete development plan that uniformly applies to all of the city.

USAC, and specifically the Financial Supports Commission, should create a committee of students within the office dedicated to finding ways to make housing more affordable in Los Angeles.

This specific committee could collaborate with professors who have completed extensive research in housing and community development policies and public housing in order to develop a concrete proposal to take to local city officials and lobby for the restructuring of housing development plans and financing.

By utilizing research and a relationship with professors who specialize in areas like community economic development and housing to find an efficient way to demand a smart growth plan, students would be acting as advocates for the entire community. These connections and research are not obtainable for other L.A. residents who also struggle to find and to pay for housing, so UCLA students are the ones who need to take advantage of their resources and channel them into taking tangible steps to make living more affordable for everyone.

In doing that, students would show that they are not satisfied with Band-Aid solutions and are committed to addressing the root of affordability problems in Los Angeles.

Although the “real world” is a subject every student tries to avoid for as long as possible, climbing rent prices is something that can’t and shouldn’t be ignored. If these issues continue to be repeatedly pushed aside, they’re only going to get worse.

Students need to take it upon themselves to be advocates now, and then maybe life in Los Angeles after graduation will seem less daunting.