Aibu to not want a £15 minimum wage?

[Israisingwagesworthit]

This morning I saw a post saying there are calls for a £15 per hour minimum wage.

I understand fully that the current minimum wage doesn't give people enough to survive on and something needs to change to ensure everyone gets a comfortable living wage, and I support this.

However by pushing up the minimum wage doesn't that just add additional costs for businesses, therefore increase costs to consumers removing any benefit of an increased minimum wage in addition to reducing the disposable income and pay gap of anyone above minimum wage.

Surely this only benefits the government with additional income tax?

Is this the best option in a time of potential 18% inflation, would this not increase it further?

Capitalism is the issue, rather than sharing the profit wealth, CEO's (of all levels of business, small and large) keep the profits for themselves and just raise prices when costs go up.

Am i being unreasonable to assume that in order for the £15ph wage to be successful, companies must accept lower profits rather than increasing prices in line with the wage increase otherwise its just pointless and daminging to all wage earners not just the minimum wage.

Won't the government have to threaten windfall taxes to those who increase prices to maintain profits to make it work and to actually benefit minimum wage earners?

I'll admit I'm a middle earner (£40k) civil servant (so no chance of a payrise anytime soon) so would be financially damaged by a raise in minimum wage if nothing is done to stop the subsequently price increases of products after a minimum pay rise. As a result my view may be biased, but am I wrong?

Not difficult, they own approx 60b of ftse100 companies, the problem arises when insurance companies are added in.

You said Pension funds, not general investments, which would obv be far higher & as you ve not worked for all Ft100 companies and they change constantly, your anecdotal experience is worthless.

As for the the rest of your rant, not worth getting in to.

"Working in a supermarket is a far far far tougher gig than teaching"

Pull the other one. I used to work a supermarket both stacking shelves and on the checkouts as needed. The easiest job I have ever had by a country mile.

Something needs to be done about linking ceo wages and shareholder profits to the lowest paid members of staff. I dont know how in a big global economy though. But there is something off with a system where large companies make large profits but their members of staff all get top up benefits.

I actually think housing is a big issue too and proper workers housing would help low earners a lot.

It won't happen anyway. In the nhs anything below mid band 5 would be less than minimum wage if it was £15 ab hour, so it would be very expensive to increase this

No, it doesn't just add additional costs - it means that profits are reduced for those at the top and distributed further down the pecking order

Doesn't work like that I'm afraid.
And how would you apply your model to all the non-profit organisations employing people?

@Bluesky2507

Of course I "have an idea" I'm a strong trade unionist"
No money is available to raise these salaries because of ideological decisison by the conservative government.

They make these decisions because they realise
That a selfish self interested elitist or so called aspirational electorate will vote them in again & again if they have these types of policy.

People such as you "laughing" or stating that that a low status job such as supermarket workers is a tough gig helps create the me
Me me society that we live in.

My sister is a teacher. I'm not immune to the stress of her role & she definitely deserves better remuneration.

Guess what, she would Never ever ever give up her status, career progression, working hours
holidays, pension and weekends off for a supermarket role EVEN if the wage was the same.

Profits vary year to year. Would you like salaries to vary year on year, too? How about after the pandemic, for example? Sorry guys, we’ve made a loss this year so it’s pay cuts all round?

"Used to" being the operative words here.

ie a temporary gig that you had a way out of. Or why aren't you still there.

@thebutcherswife
@JustALittleHelpPlease agree with both of you,

its always pushed as militant and workers are bad for wanting more, when all they want is to get by - not like they are greedy.

Now low earners on a bit more than minimum wage are frightened that they will be working for less than someone doing a menial job.

Everyone needs. praise to combat the cost of living - the cost isn't going down so all wages need to increase. But the disparity. between the top and the bottom needs to reduce greatly and those at the top need to stop being greedy

No money is available to raise these salaries because of ideological decisison by the conservative government

I’m transported back to 1990 and the student union, being forced to listen to middle class members of the Socialist Worker Party.

Too many people have degrees. So they shouldn’t be paid much higher.
Graduate jobs need to pay enough to make the investment worthwhile. So let’s say 50k for the degree plus 30k lost wages for every year you study. That’s 140k. Over 40 years you’d need to earn an extra 3.5k per year to recoup the cost of studying. So graduates need to earn a few thousand per year more than non graduates. But not a huge amount more. Doctors maybe need to earn 10k more per year to make it worthwhile. Not 60-80k more.

@Brefugee Want to form a political party with me matey??? Lol. I 100% agree with you (see my post about Denmark) - it isn't all about minimum wage-- it's about the costs people are paying and by massively upping minimum wage a great many smaller business can't make it pay and in the larger businesses prices rocket- meaning more people out of work and higher prices for everyone not out of work.

Where we need to get a grip is on the underlying support systems, childcare, energy costs, privatisation that doesn't work, housing costs -- so so many people are private renting and it's the Wild West out there. The number of people getting rent support via UC that bears zero resemblance to what they are actually paying is massive- meaning money that is intended for food and bills us propping up their rent - people say move somewhere cheaper- this isn't always possible, requires considerable up front cash payments and disrupting children schools or childcare arrangements or jobs etc.

People who are doing fine and have low mortgages in affordable areas or social housing and relatively secure jobs really can't understand the sheer insecurity of not being in that position, especially with a family.

.

Profits vary year to year. Would you like salaries to vary year on year, too? How about after the pandemic, for example? Sorry guys, we’ve made a loss this year so it’s pay cuts all round?

John Lewis worked on a model of everyone getting some profits - its called everyone getting bonus, so no need for pay cuts when profits are lower

BINGO>

Thats ultimately what its about.

You can see it in this government most in terms of lack of accountability.

Democracy only works if there is also accountability and scrutiny. Same for Capitalism. Its no coincidence we are getting a crisis appearing at THIS particular point.

We pay all of our staff above not only the minimum wage but also above the "real living wage". We try very hard to be a good and fair employer, and to pay as much as we can. However, if the minimum wage went up to £15 per hour, we would be forced to make significant redundancies, as would the rest of our sector. I'm not sure how this would help my staff tbh.

Because some people have confused self worth with salary

I think people are missing this reality

There are likely other areas that could change and improve but the pain caused to people losing jobs and higher unemployment shouldn’t be discounted

Plus businesses going under

companies can afford to pay the proposed minimum wage, however in order not to pass the cost on to consumers they’d need of absorb the cost themselves by not giving out as high salary increases and dividends at the top level.

there’s obviously no will for that.

one year our company froze top level salaries in order to ensure the lower pay bands got a minimum payrise. So it’s not unusual. But there was a huge board level hoopla over it.

"Yesterday I saw an advert for a carer locally - the advertised rate was £10.31 day rate. 12 hours shifts… a “very generous” sleep in rate of £60 something for the whole night… who is going to take that?"

There is a massive shortage of respite locally either working with individual children or in respite centres because of lack of staff. No one wants to do what is often a difficult role for £9.50 a hour.

Guess what, she would Never ever ever give up her status, career progression, working hours
holidays, pension and weekends off for a supermarket role EVEN if the wage was the same.

@beachcitygirl even if the wages were the same, the teacher would be on less take home pay than the supermarket worker. Teachers have to pay almost 10% of their pay into their pension, they probably have £100+ of student loan to pay off every month, and £20 a month union fee.

Nope. You are conflating JLP’s bonus scheme (and other businesses’ bonus schemes) with what the PP actually asked for, which was ‘salaries of the lowest paid staff to be linked to profits’. The salaries of JLP employees aren’t linked to profits.

@Anothernamechangeplease

Or
You could reduce your dividends or freeze top level salaries.

Or

If you can't afford to live on your own salary/profit if you pay your staff £15 then maybe your business isn't viable.

@oviraptor21 - Are they really “non profit” though?

I previously worked for a small ‘charity’. There was also a ltd company behind the charity, which is common, and legal.

The CEO paid herself a massively high wage, with little in the way of work to show for it, drove a new company car, employed friends and family in dubious job roles created just for them, and then justified low pay and conditions for staff by saying there wasn’t enough “in the budget” - whilst pulling on the “we are a charity” heartstrings.

Also making a huge profit from NHS funding whilst providing a poor service to service users - which was also legal.

I am so suspicious of charities now and don’t donate. I‘ve got a friend who worked for huge charities around the world, and she says the same thing. There is always profit somewhere, and it is going to the people at the top, and to highly paid consultants who talk the talk but do bugger all in terms of actual work.

I think that the minimum wage by age should be scrapped.

Well a lot of higher earners salaries do vary year to year due to bonuses. So i suppose having minimum wage plus bonuses might be a possibility - like everyone has a share in their employer. I have given it 2 seconds thought as you can guess.

after the pandemic i did get a pay cut for one of my jobs. - it couldnt go below minimum wage but they just chopped my hours down.