Help wanted. Must be responsible, intelligent, and fair-minded. Good listeners only. High tolerance for boredom. Must be physically able to sit for hours on end. Prior experience in making life-and-death decisions a plus. Pay: $2 an hour -- plus bus fare.
Been called for jury duty lately?
In Washington state, jurors are typically paid $10 a day, plus bus fare. Have you recently hired anyone to work for $10 a day? Since juror wages are well below minimum wage, it's illegal to hire someone at so low a rate. Unless, of course, you're the government. Do you really expect the state government to obey the rules that apply to the rest of us?
That said, jury duty isn't about money. The primary reason that citizens answer the call to jury duty is a sense of a civic obligation. On the other hand, jury duty ought not be a financial hardship, either. If you work for the government or a major company, your employer probably continues your regular pay while you're at the courthouse. But employers are not required to pay you while you're on jury duty, and many don't. If you're self-employed, you're out of luck. Or if your job is to stay at home with the kids--well, $10 isn't going to pay for a babysitter for a whole day.
Skimping on jury pay biases who ends up on juries. While the law says people are required to serve when called, there are many no-shows. The current system means that we end up with too many jurors who either can afford to work for $10 a day or who have generous employers. That's not a fair cross-section of the community. At the very least, we ought to remove financial hardship as an impediment to jury service.
Who does end up serving on juries? According to a Washington State University survey, 85 percent work for the public-spirited companies that do continue their pay. That's strong evidence that far too few of us who get nothing but the jury fee show up.
The American Bar Association's Principles for Juries and Jury Trials says, "Persons called for jury service should receive a reasonable fee."
The Washington State Jury Commission wrote, "The Commission views a fee increase as its highest priority. Citizens required to perform jury service should be compensated fairly and appropriately. Legislation should be drafted requiring that current fees be raised, with the increase funded by the state."
Mind you, the Washington State Jury Commission wrote this five years ago. Nothing happened.
So groups that have given careful thought to juror pay have said to raise it. You might imagine that some important counterargument explains the lack of action. Nah, it's just sluggish policy making by our political leaders. The $10 a day rate was set more than 45 years ago, in 1959, and hasn't changed since.
Back when we in Washington last took steps to adjust what jurors earn, we decided that jury duty was worth about one-and-a-half times the minimum wage. In 1959, the minimum wage was an even dollar an hour. Today, the minimum wage is $7.35/hour. To restore jury pay to what it was in the old days, we should hand jurors $73.50 for each day they serve.
Jury service isn't a regular job. The jury service fee ought to be thought of as a "courtesy payment." The current, crummy, $10 a day is more like a "discourtesy payment." It's time to raise the jury fees. Courts should be fair to jurors and the jury panel should be a fair cross-section of the citizenry.
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Dick Startz is Castor Professor of Economics and Davis Distinguished Scholar at the University of Washington. He can be reached at econcol@u.washington.edu
This column appeared in the following publications:
Everett Herald, June 22, 2005
Tacoma News-Tribune, June 26, 2005
Bellingham Herald, June 26, 2005