I found this list of companies who pay the Living Wage (as opposed to the minimum wage).

http://www.livingwage.org.uk/employers

Although the list is probably not exhaustive, what struck me is that there are no football clubs on there, you know, the ones who wouldn't balk at paying 200k a week and much more to a player.
Surely they would pay their lowest paid workers the living wage?

its a subsidy for employers who do not pay wages sufficient to support a family - only a single person could live off a full-time basic-pay wage

desperatemunter: (I am unemployed and was amazed to learn that any unemployed have to pay it : JSA after all is calculated on the basis of being 'the amount you need to live on' - no CT element in it)

Ah, but there we have it, desperatemunter.

The 'facts' of the underlying, ridiculous poverty levels in this country are rarely highlighted anywhere.

It's just the Tory Slime repugnant garbage of how everyone is a 'scrounger' if they are poor or unemployed in this country that make the headlines -  enforced by the media in compliant Hiltleresque propaganda mentality,  as the only stories they ever carry are about the 0000000000.1% of the despicable beings that  shaft the system - like that cretin who killed his kids.

I'd line em all up against a massive wall (such would be needed to accommodate all the tw@ts) and machine gun the lot of 'em, Shanlee.

I`ll not go into detail but a relative works for a giant just outside Sheffield, he`s in a good position within the company.

The stories he tells me re profits, which are astronomical and the £6.50ph more or less all the warehouse staff etc are on. The money
those at the top actually receive and screw the company out of you wouldn`t believe.

Those at the bottom work so hard, i know because i spent a week there, they all struggle like hell financially when the company makes eye watering profits. It`s a company/brand everyone has heard of.

totally non-productive of anything worthwhile in this country
______

absolutely correct Tommy - most jobs are mickey mouse ,fabricated jobs - some given ridiculous titles - but as you say ,bugger all is produced - just a nation of passing bits of paper around in effect

we are in a mess

Absolutely, Coach.

scandanavian_haven    21 Sep 14 13:47 
A lot of people unemployed don't find going to work is worthwhile financially so they are quite content to sign on and claim benefits, and imo, I can't blame them, most people signing are unskilled workers who would be employed on or close to the minimum wage if they got a job, there are far more unskilled jobs available then there are skilled, many of those jobs get filled by immigrants who don;t worry about rent considering they share 10 to a room, given non immigrants spend more on rent then anything else every week, if social housing rents decreased by 50% next week, unemployment would drop like a stone, if only it were that simple

What social housing?

I don't know about anywhere else, but Newham Council stock was snapped up by all that could afford it when Thatcher let it all go at 33% off. 

It was a working class area, and I never knew anybody that owned their own house. 

Now, in the same place, apart from the very old, who couldn't get a mortgage in 1980, I don't know anybody who lives in a council house.

And if other poor London Boroughs did the same, there's not a lot of council houses left when you consider how many there were pre-1980.

The Tax Credit bill for low paid immigrants is £5billion per year.

The Housing Benefit bill for low paid workers in London and the south east is probably the same. 

Evictions in Newham are common (and probably other boroughs) where families have paid lots of rent, but the dodgy landlords haven't paid all the mortgage.

They pay the minimum deposit for a property, then start collecting.

They take as much as they can from tenants and pay the minimum amount to keep the bailiffs at bay, while they collect more rent. Then they vanish when the bailiffs are eventually forced to move in.

Tommy, all building sites frown upon Trade Union membership.

And lack of it, where you get told 'Do it, or you're fired' is why there are so many accidental deaths on those sites.

Would probably be £7.50 by then anyway.  My ears would have pricked up a bit more if they made it £9 or even £10 an hour.  Businesses will always cry about how they cant afford it, my advice would be to ignore them and carry on raising the minimum wage above inflation.  Bit different in the south, but a couple doing menial jobs in say tesco or macds on £9/hour would be taking home about £2500 a month between them.  Up north tha is a decent wedge on which you could realistically pay your own rent and bills, go out on the town now and then, run a car, go on a budget holiday once a year.  That is the way it should be.  London is another matter of course, should be £12 an hour there.

I didn't care either way working for firms with a trade union membership as I never needed any union help.

The downside of firms with a union is once an idiot has been there for 3 months or more, it's harder to get rid of the idiot by dismissal. Also, everybody doing the same job is on the same pay, but you always get slackers and slowcoaches. Why should they get paid the same? 

The upside of non-union firms is they treat people like sheep. They rely on you not asking for a pay rise, and staying in line with all the other sheep, so they start you on lower pay than you're worth.

But, if you think you're worth more, go and ask for it. And if you are worth it, you'll probably get it, but you'll be told (not asked, but told) - 'Don't tell anybody else.'   

Then when you get fed up after 6 years and you want to leave, but stir the sh!t, leave all your wage slips in your locker or your desk, which is the first thing the workers will raid when you're gone.

cmat, agree there might not be as many council homes as before, but plenty of people still live in them, and then there is the rise of the Housing Associations (biggest provider of newly built social housing, the rent is meant to be affordable (whatever that means) but they are not, not in real terms, their own service charges are unregulated unlike the rents which have government caps, rent or mortgages is a killer for most people and is more important than minimum wage, but yes in London is really should be 10 quid bare minimum.

Minimum wage in the State of Washington is raised to $15 an Hour
People crying, why should we pay a fast food worker $15 an Hour, will have to lay 1 in 10 staff off,
A Lot of working class Americans are all doing 2-3 jobs,
I had 3 months in Washington State this year,
Lots of poverty and War veterans on the streets,
Legalising D0pe has Not helped,Its Not the Dream its made out to be,
Locking up and Detaining Illegals is Big Business.

if good old labour hadn't imported millions from eastern europe and the third world the situation would be better than it is now

How many companies pay minimum wage because they have to by law, even though they may be struggling to make a profit, and how many companies pay it because they know,
because of the huge supply, they can get away with it ?
I am probably being very naive, but cant wages be linked to profit in some way? Something like the wages of the lowest paid 50pc of a companies workforce, is somehow linked to profit?

Does this mean dole money will jump rapidly ... maybe time to quit online poker

More people in our country, increases the cost of infrastructure needed to support them....not a good idea

Those providing goods and/or services (i.e. employers) will always want to keep their costs down so as to maximise their profit and/or the competitiveness with other similar providers , and staff are just another resource required to create those goods/services. If as a permie for a company you think when it comes to the crunch you are anything other than a resource then you are sadly mistaken, it doesn’t matter if you run a department or clean the bogs you’ll be dropped like a bag sh&t as soon as it’s better for the balance sheet to do so and that I’m afraid is just business and life.

Therefore wage levels tend to be very much down to supply and demand or the labour/skills required for those jobs. Labour in their desire to increase their client voter base and generally p&ss off anyone that has a conservative outlook (Blair is on record openly admitting to the second point), over stimulated the supply of labour via their open door immigration policy and signing up to free movement of labour in the EU.
Hence rates have been depressed at all levels for over 10 years.

£7.80 ????? That must be something for something pretty crappy. Given the average wage in the uk is about 26.5k which for an 8 hour day works out at £12.75 per hour. If you never even get to that as an adult then you've probably made some choices in life that are less than optimal.

pawras..you do not really know how poorly some people are paid