By Crystalyn Flitton

Logan is known as a college town. It is recognized for its many Utah State University students populating the entire Cache Valley community. Out of the 20,000 or so students, I can imagine that most of them are searching for employment to make college ends meet. It is hard enough to find employment as a competitive college student as it is, but finding one that pays above minimum wage is almost unheard of. Why is Logan such a hard city in which to find a good paying job?

Let me share an experience I unfortunately came across a couple of months ago regarding the issue of under-appreciated and low-paid employment in Logan. I had to quit my job of a year and a half at a local supermarket because of the refusal by management to give me a 50-cent raise. I thought I deserved one, after being employed in excellent standing with them for a long time. But when I was notified of the denial of my request, I gave them my two weeks notice, realizing they weren't going to succumb.

Now if you listen to the radio at all, or read the newspaper, or even attend any USU-sponsored activities, you know that this store is promoting its name just about around every corner. The store claims to be proud sponsors of USU in order to attract as many possible students to its well-located shopping center. But why is it then that it won't show its appreciation by raising the pay of employed students?

The reason behind the refusal, as well as other local businesses who are presented with similar situations, is that Logan has the unfair advantage over students because of the thousands of desperate college students waiting in line for a job opportunity to open up. If an employer is faced with a decision in either giving a present employee a pay raise or hiring someone new who will work at starting pay, they simply can sort through a huge stack of applications which are dropped off every day and easily find someone who will work for cheaper wages.

The problem with this is that businesses can start out new employees at basically minimum wage for a job that may require knowledge, technical experience and hard-working individuals. The same students who most likely received higher hourly wages back in high school when living in a different city. USU student Annie Boswell, 20, says she was paid a higher wage during her sophomore year in high school while working at a sandwich shop in Ogden, vs. her sophomore year in college while employed at a home for disabled elderly people in Logan. Also, companies -- mainly chains or franchises -- lower hourly wages just for the city of Logan because they know they can get away with it.

The phrase, "I am getting paid $5.15 an hour, but I couldn't find anything better here in Logan," is a sentence many of us have repeated. Five dollars and 15 cents an hour is what 14-year-olds get paid when they start their first fast-food job. I know of many friends who are hesitant and embarrassed to admit where they are employed during college because many of them are at fast-food joints or low-paying jobs. It is degrading to our driven and motivated students.

The biggest problem is that there are many students who are already struggling to make ends meet due to intensifying prices everywhere we look:

" Increased tuition at Utah State;
" Overpriced mandatory text books;
" Logan City utility price raise (electricity and water);
" Escalating gas prices;
" Monthly rent and car payments.

The last thing pressured students need is to get ripped off by employers who do not appreciate well-trained and hard working employees. There may not be a solution to this problem; otherwise, we would have witnessed it already. But in time, as Logan grows and expands as a city, I hope we will see that employers will be forced to pay students what we are worth.