More than 300 mentally retarded people are being paid less than the minimum wage to work at the state-run Woodward and Glenwood homes for the disabled.

State records obtained by The Des Moines Register under the Iowa open-records law show that 74 of the mentally retarded workers are paid an average wage of about 60 cents an hour. One averages 11 cents an hour working for a company owned by one of the world's richest private equity firms, the Carlyle Group.

Those wages are legal under a 71-year-old federal law that enables employers to pay the disabled less than the minimum wage. The law has always been controversial, but the alleged exploitation of mentally retarded employees by Henry's Turkey Service in Atalissa has rekindled the national debate on subminimum wages.

The federal law is intended to ensure that jobs are available for people who cannot perform at the same level as people without disabilities. It has proved divisive even among the disabled, their families and mental health advocates.

Citing the situation in Atalissa, the Association for Persons in Supported Employment is calling for a gradual phaseout of the minimum wage exemption. The organization says the exemption leads to a segregated work force and advances the notion that a disabled worker is not as deserving of base-line, minimum wage protections.

"The disabled is the only class of people we look at and say, 'We'll pay you based on your productivity,' " said association executive director Laura Owens.

"I don't do that when I hire a woman or an African American or a Native American. When we hire other people, we say we're going to pay them according to their value to the company," she said.

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