unsalaried

House Bill 1 provides around $32 million in funding for legislative staff, as well as meals and travel stipends for unsalaried legislators.

Under state law, New Mexico’s unsalaried Legislature convenes in mid-January for 60 days in odd-numbered years and 30 days in even years.

Ms. Ukeles’s piece comes at a time when the pandemic has plunged the city into a fiscal crisis not seen since the 1970s, when the artist first took her unsalaried position with the sanitation department.

“They’re cleaning up unsurmountable garbage, they’re being bouncers, closing parking lots, sanitizing and wiping things down,” she says, adding that these employees are often seasonal, unsalaried workers.

Viewed through today’s understanding of the unfairness of unsalaried college athletes propping up billion-dollar enterprises, those “improper benefits” were actually reasonable payment for services rendered.