http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2009/01/23/f-money-minimum-wage.html
Summary
The purpose of minimum wage is to provide work for those who are unskilled or non-unionized and also to prevent undercutting. In the 19th century, there was no minimum wage throughout the country. However, by 1912, over 100,000 workers belonged in a union which helped the workers lead to the creation of minimum wage in 1918. By 1960, all of Canada had minimum wage. Today, the minimum wage rate varies partially by inflation and by an ad-hoc basis. Exception to minimum wage in Canada varies, including the self-employed, students in training programs, and more. There is a large amount of people who depend on minimum wage, and they are barely getting by. According to Campaign 2000, 45% of low income children live in a family where at least one parent worked full-time. Some say the solution can be to increase the minimum wage. However, it can lead to job cuts. Others say that it is not a matter of increasing the wage, but rather to provide wage supplements.
Connection
Chapter 16 discusses about payroll and the procedures of how to record it into journal entries. In the article, wages are discussed in more detail. The article talks about minimum wage, something that is not discussed in the text book. Wages are for people with "blue-collar" jobs, meaning people who perform manual labour, such as construction workers and farmers. Minimum wage is the same thing, but the pay is the lowest amount paid by the employer to make sure the person can have a decent living. However, people who make a living with minimum wage can barely make a living, let alone a decent one.
Reflection
For people who are barely getting by on minimum wage, I think raising the wage is not a healthy solution. If the minimum wage increases, small businesses would want to hire less employees and have the employers work more than they should to compensate the amount of work that would be needed from the person who could have gotten a position if the minimum wage did not increase. Because this possible solution can produce these consequences, it can worsen the economy. As a solution, I think the people who are unable to make a decent living with minimum wage should look for social welfare. Furthermore, they should be educated in learning how to invest and save to be able to earn a decent living.
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Catrina, I agree with you that people should learn how to save money for their future. However, social welfare is usually for people with low or no income. Therefore, full time minimum wage workers can not apply to this benefit. Also, I believe social welfare can be misleading for some people because they can work less than a normal person and get an adequate amount for survival. As well, I found B.C. as an embarrassment because all the provinces across Canada have increased their minimum wage to improve living standards while B.C. falls behind with $8 an hour. I personally believe that there should be laws illustrating the amount of wage an employer must pay an employee after the amount of time they have work for their company or else the consequence may be $8 an hour till the employee find a higher wage job.
ReplyDelete-Angela Tong
I agree when you said that higher minimum wage means lower employment rate and that people should learn to invest and save to make a decent living. However, many recent immigrants have nothing and come to Canada for a better life. Many people around the world think that BC is a great place to live. With the living expenses rising and the wages going nowhere, how are these people be able to continue living. Social Welfare is an option, but how much money will they get to live a decently. Learning how to invest and save the money is good, but how do they have the money to begin with, if they are trying so hard to make ends meet.
ReplyDeleteJessica Ye