There’s a simple way to fight the cost of living emergency: a £15 an hour minimum wage
While government ministers are once again focused on saving their own jobs, away from Westminster people are still struggling to stay afloat. There is rightly a focus on rising prices, but not nearly enough on the other side of the coin: low pay. Put simply, people are struggling to pay their bills because their wages are not keeping up.
This is not new. Average pay is still less in real terms than it was in 2008. More than a decade of wage stagnation has meant that sharp price rises have hit workers harder. A low-wage economy is a fragile one and, as we have already seen, can quickly result in people choosing between heating and eating, or unable to do either. In one of the richest countries in the world, this is the result of a political choice – and a repugnant one at that.
Workers deserve a pay rise, and we should be fighting for a £15-an-hour minimum wage. According to new research from the Progressive Economy Forum, £15 an hour isn’t just the right thing to do, it makes economic sense – compensating for stagnating wages over the last decade and providing some defence against high inflation. If introduced in 2024, instead of the proposed rise to £10.50, the poorest 70% of households would see a 6.9% increase in their incomes, with the worst off benefiting the most. Alongside other measures, such as increasing benefits for those unable to work and banning zero-hours contracts, it could be transformational for those on the lowest incomes.
£15 an hour is affordable. Even accounting for the increase in public sector wages, the government would still be £25bn per year better off from the change, as a result of spending less on universal credit payments and collecting much more in income and other taxes. Many large companies
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