UK The minimum wage problem.

reply to post by yg2bfkm


You make some valid points.
But you don't think they are in any way original do you?

And because 'the elites' take the piss and continue to exploit and manipulate that justifies you ridiculing and belittling people and assuming some imaginary superior position to those less fortunate or less able than you?

Personally I much prefer trying to be part of the solution and the change rather than enabling and being part of the problem.

reply to post by yg2bfkm

I don't care about any poverty or any hardship because it doesn't affect me and it won't affect me either.

Karma has a habit of biting people in the arse.

reply to post by Freeborn


The problem is there will ALWAYS be people prepared to work for minimum wage; slavery wages. Until you can get every single person in the UK to refuse to work for less than £10 per hour, the story won't change. Companies will always be able to put bums on seats.

And guess what, say the minimum wage does go up; corporations will take advantage of this and just up the price so that the cost of living will rise, effectively canceling out any wage increases.

The only way you can get out of this mess is to remove yourself from the group that this system targets; the ignorant, zombie, easily led, uneducated pleb group. The group that happily takes this daily raping. Realize you're part of this group; and then you can get out of it.

The group will always exist; so I don't feel sorry for them at all; it's their fault for sleepwalking into it.

reply to post by yg2bfkm

The problem is there will ALWAYS be people prepared to work for minimum wage;

Sorry, you're looking at things arse about face.

The problem is there will ALWAYS be people willing to only pay minimum wage despite being more than able to pay more.
And unfortunately as long as that is the case there will ALWAYS be people who have to accept minimum wage to try and provide for themselves and their families.

But wft do you care, you're alright Jack.

Good God! Stop feeding the troll! Have more sense!

I have to say this thread was getting really interesting until everyone began to respond to the troll. Now you have allowed this wannabe posh idiot with the intellectual development of a chav to totally derail the thread. And what for? Endlessly abusive responses that feed off attention and contribute nothing.

I suggest to get back on topic and resume fruitful discussion of the minimum wage and living costs in this country.

Originally posted by SteveR
Good God! Stop feeding the troll! Have more sense!

I have to say this thread was getting really interesting until everyone began to respond to the troll. Now you have allowed this wannabe posh idiot with the intellectual development of a chav to totally derail the thread. And what for? Endlessly abusive responses that feed off attention and contribute nothing.

I suggest to get back on topic and resume fruitful discussion of the minimum wage and living costs in this country.

Well said
That was why I stopped responding to people, however, sometimes the trolls help bump the thread by the shear number of posts they cause therefore making the thread more visible.

It was odd how the very next day after I started this thread they announced the new LIVING WAGE scheme. I'm gonna convince myself they saw this thread and thought they ought to be seen to do something about it

Originally posted by yg2bfkm
Oh and by the way, minimum wage is perfectly acceptable to live on.

Let me see.. what does someone who works minimum wage really need?

Cigarettes?
Booze?
Computers?
Internet?
Petrol?
Car Insurance?
Rent?
Food?

No no no.. that's the list of someone working a job above minimum wage... here's a list for someone who's working a job on minimum wage:

Food.
Rent.

Anything you can buy extra is a bonus and you should be very happy with that.

Problem is all you "me, me, me" entitled little twerps just want everything handed to you on a golden plate don't you?

Good bye, middle class. I think the problem is that there is an elite who believes that the dainties of civilization only belong to them. Anything requiring oil, minerals, fine woods, and such is wasted on the rest of humanity. Even the low parts of a pig is too much to ponder going to a peon. Fine organic foods like blackberries, mushrooms, and almonds is wasted on the unwashed. So the rest of humanity lives on chemically flavored starches, ersatz meats, and corn syrup confections. Living quarters will be hamster cages for humans. Economies are not matters of "there is no alternative". Thing is economic systems are designed by the the few to be imposed upon the many. So we have economies with landlocked housing markets, product monopolies, and allodial tax exemptions. Get rid of currencies that are wasting assets. Such currencies ensure that corporations can cut wages without doing a thing. Make sure idle land gets punished for remaining idle. Be ruthless about breaking up cartels and monopolies. Be sure to punish offshoring of any type with effective tariffs, and immigration controls. Problem is how do the people make sure these things happen?

reply to post by VoidHawk


Same minimum-wage over the country is not good. I see it from first-hand here. Many, even skilled workers are underpaid.

I like the system in Finland, where different trades have unions. There is no overall minimum-wage, although the unions set minimum-wages for the companies, so people with real skills would get paid more. It is not corrupt yet, so it is working currently, as far as I have heard from my parents living there.

Greed is ruining the society, all very capitalistic societies have huge problems with wealth gaps. The rich do not need to work anymore, their money works for them and gains them more wealth, as the poor one´s work 50 hour weeks and have to spend every dime they have on living.

reply to post by VoidHawk


Living in Britain was always a crappy proposition, if you were born working class it was always going to be a struggle. In Holland ,rents were capped at a fith of your wage, people always seemed happier, Germany after the War was humming and prosperous. France seemed to know what life was all about. You always seemed to see lots of cops in Britain, it looked like a police state with the people really scared of breaking the law. In the fifties it had a bankrupt economy, but managed to bring in for a few moments in its history, the NHS. For a few years during the reconstruction things looked promising. But the fact remains, its a little Island with far to many people living on it. With the weather getting worse, everything will keep going up. Is there one country in Europe left that can be said to have a decent economy, and is actually worth living in? If there is then its a model to copy. Its fairly obvious that the PTB are paranoid with what they have accomplished so far, just by looking at all the cameras all over the place. What a craphole! If you had some land at least you could grow some food but I bet there is a law against that as well.

I thought I´ll add a point from corporations viewpoint. I am not justyfying their actions, although the low wages are often not entirely their fault, but the fault of the whole model.

I was recently having a chat with a friend of mine, who is in the board of the largest food chain round here. We were talking about the salaries and I asked him: "Why are the salaries so low in your company?". He gave a simple answer: If I rose the salaries of every lower level employee by 1 euro an hour, the company would be in extreme loss and bankrupt within years".

1000 pounds does not seem as much, compared to the profits the corporation is making. Yet one has consider that you can not rise the salary of only one person. If one lower-level employee gets 1000 pounds extra, everybody has to get their salaries raised. Now imagine a company has 10,000 workers. Rising everybody salaries by 1000 pounds a year, it would cost 10, 000, 000 pounds for the company. Raising the salaries by 1000 a month would mean 120,000,000 pounds extra costs.

I took one well-know British retail company Sports Direct. I do not know how well they are paying there workers, although I can assume they are not paying well.I do not know any retail store who does.

They have around 18,000 workers. Based on Google search, I found the base salaries were around 14k for lower level, which is low salary in England. Now imagine rising the salaries of all of them by 12k a year. It would be around 216 million extra pounds for salaries. The operating income was 158 million pounds, 105 million after taxes. If salaries were raise, it would means 58 million pound loss in every year.

If Walmart raised the salaries of all their quite low-paid employees by 10k a year, leaving 200,000 highest salaries, it would mean the company has 5 billion dollar loss every year.

McDonalds would be losing around 5 billion dollars if we left out 800,000 of the highest paid workers...

There are so many people working in every major company that even small raises add up to a huge amount of money for the company.


We can also not forget the stockholders. The stockholders make the value of the company. If nobody wants to buy the stocks, the value is inexistent. Basic Supply and Demand makes up the value of a stock.

If I as an investor buy some stocks, I do not want them to lose value. In order to earn well from the dividends I need to make quite an investment. Apple is paying 3,05 dollars dividends on every share this year. Every share costs 450 dollars. Paying 450 dollars to earn an extra 3 dollars is quite a risk, isn´t it? One needs to pay 450k to earn 3k dollars every 3 months. Imagine now if the profits were lower. Not many people might buy. The stock loses 10% of its value. I have lost 45,000 dollars. You now might understand why companies need to think on their shareholders also... It is very risky to buy stocks in the firsthand.

The system is complex and even big companies do not have it easy. . The CEOs have extreme responsibilities in front of shareholders. 10% loss in company value might lose billions of invested money, of the money of others who have decided to purchase the stocks.

The system is created to be like that, it is not good for the lower-level workers and never can be, as there are too many of them and the company holds also responsibility over people who have given them their money to operate with. The profits are not high enough for everybody to earn well, as the investors have taken a great risk in order to earn even something from the stocks (Paying 450k to earn 3k with the risk of losing much more, but also gaining much more if the stocks value rises by 10% I earn 45k)

The current system is never able to benefit everybody...

Perhaps the nub of it all is, that no one should get a wage more than three times as much as anyone else..Get the greed out first, then people will be in trades and professions because they have the talent for it and not the desire to earn big money. Suddenly the economy would be awash with money and growth. Establish a good living wage, then make everybody live by it. Because at this rate a few people will be earning all the money and most will be poor, "money always goes to money" .....No hope no fear...Capitalism always comes to this.

I think your examples are just a little bit extreme
For example you said

Originally posted by Cabin
Now imagine rising the salaries of all of them by 12k a year.

Most people don't even earn 12k per year!!
For god sake, go down to the unemployment office and get on their terminals and just take a look at the wages being offered - That's assuming you can actually find a vacancy!
Please ignore those jobs you see that are placed purely for public consumption in the press, they are 99% fake.

Are you aware that if all those corporations who have their businesses here in the uk, but use loop holes etc to avoid paying tax here, if those corps were forced to pay that tax, we could pay of our entire national debt in less than two years!!
And you tell me they cant afford to pay more!

Originally posted by anonentity
Perhaps the nub of it all is, that no one should get a wage more than three times as much as anyone else..Get the greed out first, then people will be in trades and professions because they have the talent for it and not the desire to earn big money. Suddenly the economy would be awash with money and growth. Establish a good living wage, then make everybody live by it. Because at this rate a few people will be earning all the money and most will be poor, "money always goes to money" .....No hope no fear...Capitalism always comes to this.

Some common sense at last.
Though I think those earning the least should be guaranteed a decent wage.
For example. A person working full time, after paying the general cost of living, should have enough left over to save for a holiday, be able to decently cloth and feed his children, be able to afford a decent place to live etc.
If he cant do that, then he is no more than a slave.

reply to post by VoidHawk


That's right, it also locks in a value for money, like if you save up you can get what you want, The so called socialy advanced countries Sweden Norway Denmark etc do it through taxation. If you start to earn obcene amounts it gets supertaxed back. Another point in not being to get more than three times the basic livable wage, is purely the fact that one person dosn't need more than one car, or one house it would cut a lot of waste out. Plus the joke wages that bankers and politicos are paying themselves would be curtailed. Plus the fact it might get things back to a "meritocracy".. Where kids staying on at school are just clogging up the system, and helping the unemployment figures look better. If you do a meaningless job for 8 hours a day, you should get paid well and have a life after you clock off. Education and health should be free. At this rate the natural proclivity for the British Isles, to exist in a neo Dickensian state kissing each others arses, will be reached in another decade.
The ones holding obcene amounts of money, at the moment will say it cant be done. But it will have to be done or they will loose it all, you cant lock up the majority.

reply to post by VoidHawk

This decline in the real standard of living of the working and now the middle class, is one of the greatest con jobs of the modern era. Has anyone actually noticed the day the Soviet Union closed up shop, was the day it all started. Before that the there was a genuine fear of the ruling classes in Britain, and America for that matter that Communism, could be established quite swiftly and nationalisation of assets did actually get going after the second world war in Britain. As long as the Soviet Union existed the establishment of Communist states would have been easy. Suddenly the Brits had a world class health system, decent council housing etc .and plenty of jobs sucking up all the demobilised soldiers. Well they had to didn't they? you couldn't have a load of well trained squaddies calling the shots. All this in a totally broke nation that had just given up its empire, and the megabucks that used to pour in from it. Then there was Germany, that had to be the shining light of capitalism so the eastern Block countries that looked over the border would envy the capitalist miracle. It was twenty years after the war the standard of living for the average german was very nice. So is it with any wonder that the timing of the demise of the Soviet Union was crucial...I mean if it had lasted much longer into the digital age, there was the strong possibility that it might have worked. With a command economy you would have had production rates comparable with China, and no worries about raw materials.Think about that one.

Originally posted by NeoSpace

I don't know about American tax's but here income tax is at 20% then there's local council tax, mine was 12% of my wages, that 32% of my wages taken before I have even paid my rent which was just under 60% of my wage packet, and that was a cheap small flat.
Plus everything you buy has a 20% tax on top.

The government are scratching their heads woundering why shops and businesses are failing and high streets have loads of empty shops, because people have no money left to spend after the high tax's and rent.

Since this is old and I haven't read through this entire thread (intend to) I will say we struggle as well while bankers continually get paid huge bonuses for (?) our oops THE fed prints money(known as the petro dollar) and lowers the dollar value while our gov't continue to regulate, strangulate small to mid level businesses. Their are billionaires that earn on the backs of illegal immigrants, as well as laying or "shedding" jobs since '08 and our economy is still staggering.

He there are 47 million people on SNAP (government stipend to buy food for a month / certain amount for each qualifying mem in the household). So many have been on unemployment for so long (2 years partial pay of your latest income which is paid by the former employer). Those people have taken the minimum wage jobs, as well as the elderly, who can't afford to live on social security income paid from gross pay weekly while employed. Many believe it will be in the red in 2030, due to the large amount of retirees now. Many people say it is already red because we are trillions in debt and our gov't spends without limits. Not enough of the essentials. All states have representatives for two legislative houses who all of them have their billion dollar projects they want funded; usually benefits the elite not the majority. We do have a sort of housing - subsidized and commensurate with your income. Unfortunately rampant with thugs, drugs and scarcely educated tenants.

Our healthcare is atrocious. Big pharma here run their own trials, give our docs big $ to keep them treating symptoms rather than solve the illness. Our vaccines are loaded with mercury and the public school system requires our children to have an insane amount of them pumped into them before they are one, a form of genocide - seems to me it effects you once they have you in the system for the prime of your life. If you didn't spend a ton on loans for university you would be hard pressed to gain a cush job where the company partially contributes to your retirement and healthcare. (which the retirement funds have been ravaged because of our stocks.) Our healthcare is absurd. We have to pay anywhere from $300-$900 a month per person depending on if you want a choice of drs, a hi or lo deductible, well-care, comprehensive and if you want to insure hospital care. Our meds that treat the symptoms so many people have because of GMOs, fluoride, mercury, farm raised fish, hormone and antibiotic treated animals sold for food. Too many have been dumbed down, dubbed depressed and on psychotropic drugs which has crazy/maddening side affects.

HA, sorry that's just the cliff notes. But does offer the 50k ft view from my personal perspective.

I clicked onto a signature about this thread to learn more about the UK system. My partner is a Brit and wants to return at the beginning of the year. I have only lived in ONE state and thought well since I wont be able to afford travel maybe the UK is a better place to raise our 4 year old. Combined we already have adult children. I know enough about the education system that the 4 year old will not go to school here. My back is wrecked with degenerative disease and there is no way to get the appropriate care, quickly.

I guess I will stop here. I did intend for this to be a quick summary but realized to counter the issues there vs. here it needed more than a couple of paragraphs. Or maybe I am just chatty!