In a national labor shortage, how do employers ensure they can attract and retain the best talent? While there is something to be said for benefits and upskilling, at its core the answer may be even more obvious: pay workers a living wage.

That is where prevailing wage laws come into play. Prevailing wage laws are local minimum wages for state-contracted service and construction workers based on payroll records in that area. Research from the Illinois Economic Policy Institute and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign has found that service contract prevailing wage laws can mean the difference between workers like custodians falling above or below the poverty line.

“We found that prevailing wage laws improve the chances that a blue-collar worker will be in the middle-class and have a degree of economic security,” says Frank Manzo IV, the executive director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute and co-author of the study. “Essentially, prevailing wage laws can ensure that folks can actually afford to live in the communities where they're doing the work.”

In fact, these laws boosted annual incomes for custodians by as much as 9.5%, with those in states without prevailing wage laws making an estimated $24,791 and those in states with prevailing wage laws making around $30,000. States with prevailing wage laws also saw as high as a 3.5% increase in health insurance coverage for custodians as well as an up to 5% increase in custodians who were employed full-time,...

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