Fifty cents an hour. That’s how much Lizet Palencia was being paid in 1994 when she began her first job as a live-in domestic worker in New York City.
“I had to do everything for them,” Palencia said. “I remember it was 1 in the morning, 2 in the morning, I was still washing dishes.”
“I was just focusing on getting the money because I needed it,” she said.
More than two decades later, domestic workers in New York City are still not granted their full rights – not only in wages, but also in terms of health insurance, the right to one day off per week, and in some cases, even the right to work without physical and sexual harassment in the workplace.
In 2010, New York became the first state in the nation to enact a Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights. The law was passed after years of lobbying, with domestic workers across the state sending handwritten letters to legislators in Albany. Although domestic workers won basic rights through the law, the right to bargain collectively was not one of them, and enforcement of the Bill of Rights has been almost impossible. But some domestic workers in New York think this has allowed them to focus on worker-led, grassroots organization tactics.
The Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights Today