I believe that the minimum wage should be enough to enable a working couple to feed and clothe a family of four and keep a roof over their heads.

[Mamarsupial]

I don’t think I am BU for a moment, interested to see how many agree with me.

Yes, we just subsidise business

I can hazard a guess who some of them are.

Of course it should!

The fact this 'concept' could be seen as controversial is testament to how brainwashed we all are by capitalism's rule.

@Mezmer - yes, people forget. Holidays, central heating, eating out, more than one car... these were middle class things which depended on spare money. The state is not going to fund a middle class quality life for 70 per cent of the population. Unless we all pay a lot more tax. British people are cheap - they want scandi public services but not the tax to fund them.

My Grandad worked in the workshop of a shop all his life. He never made much money, these days he would only be earning slightly more than minimum wage. He had no qualifications. But he managed to clothe and feed two kids and my Nanna on that and they bought a house in a sought-after area of a nice, leafy London borough (which is now worth £700k ) in 1960. Meanwhile me and DH are both in professional jobs we had to do postgraduate degrees to do, and could only buy a house in a dodgy bit of an adjoining dodgy borough to where my grandparents lived (and I grew up) when my parents helped us out with a deposit. It's depressing.

Sorry posted too soon... what I was going to add was that my grandad did a necessary job that he took great pride and pleasure in. Just because it didn't pay much doesn't mean that it wasn't worthwhile. We need people in those jobs and you should be able to have a nice life doing them.

YANBU
Of course it should. Be it a couple with 2 kids, or a single parent with 1... their wage should be enough to eat, heat, clothe, have a home and also nice things too.
We now live in a time where a single person with no kids is still having to have a wage top up via benefits. How is that right?
Am fed up with people saying to work your way up and out of poverty. We need people working on the lowest rungs of the ladder so society can exist.
And sometimes, there is no progression in your role. I worked my way to the top of a Band 1 NHS job. There was no where to go after that. Supervisor role? There was 3 supervisors to 60+ staff. When a job did come up, most would go into it all enthusiastic and then go back to their old job. The responsibility and shit you got from higher up was not worth it at all.

Apparently, it is about 7% who earn minimum wage. Not 70!

I also feel that minimum wage need not be enough to afford going-away holidays or saving money (I think the emphasis on saving is misplaced if we have a living wage that's an actual living wage, right?)

But central heating is important. Yes, people haven't always had it - but people die without it. It's not just a luxury. I agree with the poster who said we shouldn't make it a race to the bottom.

So well said.

I am disturbed that so many people on this thread seem to think minimum wage jobs are some kind of sign of a person's failure to gain experience or skill.

I agree employers should be made to pay more money for minimum wage. At least £12 per hour. Government should make employers pay properly instead of doling out benefits tax payers have to pay for. The employers are making the profits. Then more tax could be spent on education and public services.

Why should someone on NMW not be allowed to save?
Appliances break down, vehicles break down, pets get ill/hurt.
Is it good and right that someone on NMW has £0 in their bank account after the essentials have gone out?

I think this is about right.

Excellent point.

Hmmmn the same ones who have been on similar threads this evening 😉

Why should someone on NMW not be allowed to save?
Appliances break down, vehicles break down, pets get ill/hurt.
Is it good and right that someone on NMW has £0 in their bank account after the essentials have gone out?

I think NMW should be enough to cover that kind of saving, for sure. I meant more, I think it is perfectly reasonable if NMW doesn't cover you to save for, say, two weeks in Spain or a house deposit so long as there is secure, appropriate rental or social housing.

I think our current perception that saving is vital is partly to do with the endless fear that there isn't a good safety net if the worst happens. If there were that safety net, we might feel differently?

I would like the benefits top up to be phased out while increasing the NMW.

The taxpayer has been subsidising poor wages and its fucked up. Employers should be paying staff wages, not anyone else.

Shouldn't minimum wage be something that you are on when young, but aspire to move away from by the time you have kids?

For a multitude of reasons, not everyone can move on on from minimum wage work.

Depending on kids ages childcare cost could wipeout one persons wage.

Alas cost of living. You are being unrealistic. Are you on min wage op?

Just shy of £40k before tax.... no factor in everything and see what's left!!!

You can aspire all you like!

At the moment, there are many people who will not get work that isn't minimum wage or very close to it, because there are a lot of jobs like that, and far fewer at higher wage points. Ok, sure, you could change that if you brought in a law insisting people who'd been in a job for x number of years must be moved off minimum wage, but I'm not sure how feasible that would be.

I don't know how comfortable I feel with the idea of saying that, if you earn an inadequate minimum wage that isn't a living wage, you somehow deserve it? You can't aspire yourself out of there being no better jobs. You can't aspire yourself out of having a disability, or low intelligence, that has stopped you from acquiring skills or experience. You can't aspire yourself into owning a car that'll increase the number of jobs open to you. Etc. etc.

It is really easy to get stuck in a minimum wage job, too. If it happens to be a job that doesn't offer much by way of progression, how attractive are you to employers elsewhere? Perhaps not very.

I think you misunderstood. She's not saying it is like this. She's saying it should be like this!

Agree OP. It's bizarre that taxpayers subsidise employers. It's wrong that so many people need foodbanks. It's not just wages we subsidise firms for either - taxpayer indirectly subsidises harmful policies (e.g. some firms encourage coming in whilst covid positive - if x/y/z get sick as a result of that worker coming in and need time off or get too sick to work for the foreseeable, meh, taxpayers can pay the health costs and economic impacts of that).

When I rule the world my plan is this:

National living wage is set. Let’s say that’s £25k for a 35 hour week.

Businesses can pay less if they want to but must pay at least minimum wage. Let’s say that is £20k.

However, any large business that pays any of its staff (or outsourced staff such as cleaners, reception, security) less than the living wage and expects those people to use government benefits to top up is subject to strict penalties.

This could include limitations on director and board level salaries. E.g. no more than 10 times the lowest wage that they pay. E.g. If they insist that they think people can live on the £20k,l they pay, then is it not reasonable to assume the highest paid can manage on £200k? (There would be penalties on shares and dividend payments too not just income).
If they say their business cannot afford to pay the living wage, then maybe the business isn’t sustainable and the directors don’t deserve £2m salaries until it is sustainable.

Why do we allow business to privatise profit, but socialise low wages.

Im sure the devil is in the detail but would be a good experiment.

Moving up doesn’t mean you have to be the CEO, but we should not be on minimum
wage years after working with childcare etc.

Minimum wage is the wage you start at and the minimum you can be paid e.g you stop schooling at what 17 or let’s even say after university as a young single person, you should not be on same minimum wage 5, 10 years later married with children.

There are 2 issues I see here, first wage has not grown in the Uk and we become comfortable and accepting of low wages, it’s alarming the number of people we have working full time and still needing UC for basic needs, we should be paying more. Secondly we have also lost the drive as a nation to improve and be better, you have many people just content on minimum wage supplemented by UC and happy to stay there for years and years.

I recall a thread a few days ago where someone was moaning that she saw a job spec and the pay offered was too high at £30k+, seriously moaning that the pay is too much when it’s not even that high, what would she say if the salary was £100k?

That's just not true.

There is a different minimum wage for people under 23. The current system already accepts that you should have several pay rises after you leave school or finish university.

If you don't know this, I don't think you are equipped to have a view on the thread.