Greens pledge £15 minimum wage for all workers

Lol they just copied and pasted that number from the US, didn’t they?

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I understand the will to get wages on the up again, but I don’t know if this is really the best idea, especially given how much small businesses are already struggling. FTR the UK already has one of the highest minimum wage rates in Europe – raising it doesn’t necessarily guarantee better prospects for workers.

Not gonna make anyone’s life easier as long as the income tax threshold stays at £12500 just gonna be cannibalising people’s wages even faster

So a full time equivalent of £29.2k

Surprised they didn’t go for £20 so everyone can be better than the average!

I guess it nicely piggybacks on their heavy US inspired messaging.

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Its been shown time and again that increasing the minimum wage doesn’t translate to increased wages for everyone else, even the last government’s own review into it found there’s no significant evidence of spillover effects for people earning much above minimum wage. Whilst those a little above the new minimum tend to see increases to keep them more than a little above it, once you’re a few thousand over the new minimum you see no effects at all.

Raising the minimum wage is just increasing wage compression, the government (and all the other parties who want to end up in government) need to investigate other tools – the economy doesn’t benefit from minimum wage rising and most other wages compressing.

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I’m a small business owner.

I pay my base staff pretty close to that anyway and the increase on my costs simply isn’t comparable to what I’ve had to deal with in terms of getting goods on shelf. A higher minimum wage would be a drop in bucket.

From my own perspective and from my employees as well the problem is similar: cost of living outstripped anyone that makes less than idk say 40k a year a *long* time ago.

Sure it’s nice to have a bit more money and why not, but it’s a paltry sum in comparison.

Initially, I liked the Greens. Zack seemed to be more upfront with left-leaning principles, and he was vocal enough to sound like he could make it happen in a sane way.

Nowadays, I don’t know what the fuck is going on at Green Party HQ, but wow, they’re losing the plot. While I absolutely think that either salaries need to go up drastically, or costs need to go down, raising the minimum wage is going to result in two things happening:

* A lot of businesses won’t be able to sustain themselves, and we’ll see job cuts, and economy fallout.

* An absolute erosion of so many industries that require experience, but whose base pay for entry-level employees hasn’t grown for a long time.

I’ve worked as a software engineer in some creative industries outside of London, and both software and creative jobs have suffered since the pandemic. This minimum wage would equal the salaries that some businesses request for software developers, designers, analysts, lots of roles that need a mixture of a degree and experience. Hell, I’ve seen mid-level design roles near me that pay the same as baristas – a £15 minimum wage would effectively remove uni as an option for many STEM and arts roles.

Sure so uh.

I guess we’ll just exist in a two class system with a lower and upper class considering the middle class doesnt exist?

What a bonkers idea. This will only cut entry level and undergrad jobs further ironically damaging the greens core voter base the most

That’s great but what’s the plan for when suddenly you get paid the same at Costa coffee compared to what the NHS pays a nurse? Oh and the NHS also has to now pay the band 2-3 staff more than what the band 4 staff currently get who are registered professionals?

My wife works in retail as a manager of a high street shop. They don’t have a huge number of staff or turn over. As a manager, I think she earns about £33k (yes she should probably have moved on from this job a while ago, but she enjoys it). £15p/h at a 40hour week, would mean that a general employee would be earning £31500.

Now, it would be great if the company then went and said everyone else is getting a pay rise and my wife would be on £40k or something like that. But it cannot happen, not without huge price increases. Price increases which we as consumers already don’t want to pay, there are cheaper options (not as good) online, and everything else is already expensive.

I just think, increasing the minimum wage over the last few years, as much as the governments have been doing, is pricing people out of employment. Again, going back to where my wife works. 10-12 years ago, I can store had a manager, assistant manager, team leaders and then your regular staff. In the last 10-12 years, they have got rid of assistant managers and team leaders. Now they basically have a manager and staff (some will earn extra key holder pay).

The minimum wage increase has been great for those at the bottom, but anyone else in the middle, it’s hit everybody hard. With less jobs and stagnant wages for those who are working. And less opportunities to advance.

I’m not sure what the answer is, but just putting up the minimum wage every year or so is not working. Our economy is stagnating, perhaps slowed down by the increases.

For me it’s simple.

If you have a business which relies on the idea that your employees will struggle financially, then you don’t have a viable business plan.

Starting your own business isn’t meant to make you rich. It’s meant to be a living. Far too many business owners don’t seem to get that these days.