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INTRODUCTION
On February 23, 2004, San Francisco raised its minimum wage from $6.75 to $8.50.2 While many workers undoubtedly celebrated this pay increase, many local industries and employers began to look for alternative business locations as a way of avoiding the extra $1.75 per hour they would be forced to pay each employee.3 This higher cost of employment in the San Francisco Bay Area is an important factor that contributes to companies sending their garment work elsewhere and perpetuates the decline of local unionized jobs. The disappearance of garment industry jobs is particularly devastating to the Chinese American community since immigrant women from Asia and China in particular make up the majority of apparel workers in the Bay Area.
Bay Area factories are closing down because of manufacturers' outsourcing to third-world countries where the cost of employing workers is significantly lower due to the lack of unions and minimum wage requirements. In many overseas factories the workers "face extreme job insecurity and are typically prevented from exercising their right to join and form trade unions."4 In some cases, workers are forced to work triple shifts in sweatshop conditions. Few incentives exist for manufacturers and employers to keep the garment industry local.
The last unionized apparel factory in San Francisco, the San Francisco Sewing Association, officially closed on September 30, 2004. Skilled garment workers, such as Christina Bautista who worked at the San Francisco Sewing Association for 22 years, are left with few employment opportunities and have been forced to take lower paying, nonunionized jobs in order to make a living.5 The few companies that have attempted to keep the industry local do so at the expense of their employees. For instance, in March 2004, local clothing line Ben Davis, Inc. attempted to cut employee benefits and vacation time as a way of making up for the salary increase it would have to provide to employees as part of San Francisco's new minimum wage law. Employees stated that the company threatened to close down the San Francisco factories and outsource to Central America and China if the employees did not voluntarily give up all of their sick days and most of their paid holidays.6 The loss of jobs at Ben Davis would have been extremely significant...