"If someone were to work two 40-hour-a-week minimum-wage jobs with three children to support, that person would still qualify for food stamps, which means another branch of government has determined they are incapable of feeding their family," Tibbetts said. "That sort of tells you how inadequate the minimum wage is."

Although the study found cities and counties generally experienced an increase in contract costs of less than 0.1 percent of their overall budget, Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, said living wage laws pose a financial nightmare.

For that reason and others, he spurred passage of legislation in 2001 that prohibits local governments from enacting living wage laws.

"What we should not have is a crazy patch quilt of different standards of minimum wages from community to community that can produce pay inequities for people who do the same work within the same company," Stephenson said.

Living wage laws, he added, are an "artificial" and unnecessary solution.

"It is not possible to fool the economy. We can place all kinds of artificial supports for wages in place, but there is a price that has to be paid when we try to circumvent the marketplace and what the marketplace will pay. . . . The best anti-poverty program I have ever seen is a good economy."

Although Salt Lake Mayor Rocky Anderson has said he wants to sign an executive order that merely "encourages" the city to give preference to employers who pay living wages, the effort has been slowed due to legal wrangling.

A coalition of more than 20 different organizations called Utah Jobs for Justice is continuing to press for an encouragement of the practice on a local level.

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E-mail: amyjoi@desnews.com