This opinion editorial was written by Tom Reed and Jorge Valdez, co-owners of Iguana Imports in Long Beach and by Gary Hytrek, professor of geography at California State University, Long Beach.
Long Beach’s tourism and hospitality industries came roaring back in 2023, delivering a nearly $1.8 billion economic impact citywide. While this was great news for those at the top, our city’s struggling small businesses and working families have been shut out of the windfall, left instead to scramble to make ends meet every month.
We have a chance to fix that. On March 5, Long Beach voters will have the opportunity to vote in favor of small businesses and working families by supporting Measure RW. A “Yes” on Measure RW will raise the minimum wage for hundreds of Long Beach hotel workers, putting more money in their pockets to spend at local businesses. Its passage would be a win for families, a win for small businesses, and a win for the city of Long Beach.
This is because, unlike global corporations like Hyatt and Hilton, the more than 1.3 million small businesses in L.A. County, many of them women and BIPOC-owned, are the backbone of our local economy. Working families spend their money where they live, which makes Measure RW an even bigger deal for this amplified impact, known within economics as the multiplier effect.
As Stephanie El Tawil with the Downtown Long Beach Alliance points out, every dollar spent in local small businesses generates “roughly 40 cents of additional revenue from ‘spillover’ activities.” Measure RW would generate an estimated extra $21 million in economic output throughout L.A. County, according to T. William Lester, Professor and Chair of the Department of Urban and Regional Planning at San José State University.
Long Beach small business owners also agree that hotel workers deserve a pay raise; more than 160 signed on in resounding support of Measure RW. Dalila Esquive, owner of Dino’s Burgers, understands the power of the multiplier effect for all working people.
“I believe that raising the wage for these workers is good for Long Beach and local businesses … because tourism workers are also consumers,” Esquive said. “When workers make more, they can spend more at businesses like mine.”
What’s more, contrary to the many myths about increases in minimum wages, thirty years of research refutes the claim that increasing the minimum wage causes increased unemployment and business closures. In reality, the foundations for a healthy economy are built on workers being paid enough to actually live, so they can support local restaurants, auto shops, pharmacies, and grocery stores.
Equally important are the effects on the hotels and hotel service. As Holly Sklar of Business For a Fair Minimum Wage reports, “When workers are paid enough to live on, they don’t have the continual stress of worrying how they will make rent or afford other basics. They are happier and more productive.”
We’ve seen this virtuous cycle before: when wages are boosted, families and the local economy thrive.
We understand the fundamental relationship between workers’ wages and the health of our local economy. Hotel workers are our neighbors and customers of the city’s small businesses; when they make a living wage, the money circulates back into the city and we all do better.
Let’s not forget the long history of public support for the Long Beach tourism sector—hotels, restaurants, and the airport—more recently reflected in the infusion of a significant proportion of the city’s COVID relief funds. Yet, while the tourism sector benefited from the influx of public cash, corporate owners still pay workers so little that many of their employees qualify for public assistance.
It’s time for voters to put a stop to this corporate double-dipping and put small business, working families, and our local economy first.
Please join us and vote “Yes” on Measure RW on March 5.
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