Built in Boston . . . for big bucks - By Jay Fitzgerald, BostonHerald.com
One local economist, the University of Massachusetts’ Alan Clayton-Matthews, said the Boston area has wealthy households that drive up costs for “personal services” in general, from construction workers to hair stylists.
Other experts suggest there could be a shortage of blue-collar workers that’s forcing prices upward in some job categories.
But Mark Erlich, head of the New England Regional Council of Carpenters, rejected both of those arguments.
Instead, he said, other parts of the country - specifically the South, Southwest and Rocky Mountain areas - have long resisted unions and used lower-paid workers, often immigrants, to keep wages low.
“It’s not that the (pay) bar is higher here. It’s that the bar is lower there,” said Erlich.