Summary
From April, 2.7 million workers will get one of the biggest pay rises in UK history as the National Living Wage rises to £11.44 an hour. But will they feel better off?
It's 25 years since the National Minimum Wage was introduced. During that time it's credited with putting billions of extra pounds in the pockets of low-paid workers. But, despite that, according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, two thirds of households living in poverty have at least one adult in work. And, according to the Institute for Fiscal studies, far from cutting the annual benefits bill, the cost of benefits paid to working families has ballooned since 1999 to about 50 billion pounds a year. So what's behind this low pay puzzle? And what can employers, governments and workers do to ensure that work pays? Pauline Mason investigates.
Presenter: Pauline Mason Producer: Ravi Naik Editor: Clare Fordham.
Contributors: Kate Bell, TUC Assistant General Secretary and former low pay commissioner Damian Grimshaw, Professor of Employment Studies, Kings College London and London & South Forum Co-Lead at the Productivity Institute Patricia Findlay, Distinguished Professor of Work and Employment Relations, University of Strathclyde, and Director of the Scottish Centre for Employment Research Matthew Fell, Low Pay Commissioner and Director of Competitiveness at BusinessLDN Nye Cominetti, Principal Economist, the Resolution Foundation James Cockett, Labour Market Economist, CIPD Margaret Esapa, Managing Director and owner, Cherry Care Services, Oxfordshire Conor Taylor, Director, Foresso
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.6 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
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| 0:36.0 | BBC Sounds, Music Radio Podcasts. |
| 0:42.0 | Thank you for listening to this edition of Analysis, the podcast that looks at the |
| 0:45.7 | ideas behind the news. In this episode Pauline Mason asks why, after 25 years of |
| 0:52.2 | rising wages, do most workers feel worse off? |
| 0:57.0 | It's not often politicians agree, but it's one success story everyone wants to be part of. |
| 1:03.6 | We'll increase the national living wage to at least 11 pounds an hour next year. |
| 1:09.1 | That's a pay rise for 2 million workers and the wages of the lowest paid over 9,000 pounds higher |
| 1:16.7 | than they were in 2010 because if you work hard a conservative government will |
| 1:22.0 | always have your back. |
| 1:24.0 | The last Labour government delivered Britain's first ever national minimum wage. |
| 1:31.0 | The next Labour government will introduce a genuine living wage. |
| 1:36.0 | I think it's been a huge success and quite often you see it picked as policy successes |
| 1:42.0 | of the last couple of decades. |
| 1:44.0 | But in 1999, when the national minimum wage was introduced, |
| 1:48.0 | it was controversial. |
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