Todd Whitcombe
As I See It
Twenty-one B.C. mayors are calling on Premier Gordon Campbell to increase the minimum wage to $10.
A joint letter to the premier's office signed and sent by B.C. mayors and the B.C. Federation of Labour asks for a minimum wage increase from the current $8 an hour and for the elimination of the $6 an hour training wage.
"Every day, we see the pressures the minimum wage freeze brings to low-wage workers in our communities and to our communities as a whole," said Burnaby mayor Derek Corrigan.
Yup. British Columbians have something to be proud of. We are leading the country in the lowest minimum wage category. Nobody does it lower than we do.
Ontario is at $10.25/hour. Imagine that. How on earth can they possibly run their province with such outrageous wages? How can business survive?
Alberta - our neighbour next door - has a slightly more reasonable wage but at $8.80/hour, it is still topping ours by 10 per cent. They are a close competitor for our No. 1 spot on the bottom of the wage pile.
Even Newfoundland can boast a wage of $9/hr. Imagine all of those minimum wage workers in Newfoundland having that extra money to spend. Of course, what are they going to do with it? Just waste it buying consumer goods from retailers - things like groceries, gas, and clothing.
British Columbia is the only province holding the line. We are number one when it comes to the lowest wage.
We're number one! We're number one!
Of course, this is not something that we really should be proud of. But it is a measure of the political forces at work in this province that no one seems willing to step forward and commit the province to an increase in the minimum wage. While prices have increased, and taxes have gone up, the working poor of the province have been left behind.
And whenever you raise the issue of the minimum wage, you get pat answers.
"Get a better job if you don't like it."
Well, that might be possible for some but not everyone is in a position to do so. Indeed, many immigrants, young people, and women really don't have many options when it comes to getting a "better job."
Students are a particular group that tend to find it difficult - partly because they are going to school and are therefore very limited in their options and partly because they are in the process of trying to acquire the skills so that they can get a better job. But they aren't there yet.
"The only people who work for minimum wage are school kids."
Not so. More than half of the people earning minimum wage are women who are well beyond school age. Some even have training at post-secondary institutions but are still treated as minimum wage workers because of the finances of the businesses they are involved in. Day care workers, teaching assistants, practical nurses, and many others are stuck at the bottom end of the pay scale.
"Minimum wage is OK because they make up the difference in tips."
Yes, people in the food service industry do make tips but not nearly as much as one might think. First up, the amount is split with the other staff in a restaurant, such as chefs and managers. Second, the amount of tips that someone can earn is dependent very much on the type of restaurant. Ever tip a cashier at McDonald's? And third, this is used as an excuse to have an even lower wage than minimum for staff.
"If we raise the minimum wage, then we are just going to have to fire a bunch of people."
This is my favourite. Think about it. What this says is that there are people working at a business that aren't necessary to its successful operation. There is redundant staff because if there isn't, then you can't fire people and not hurt the bottom line.
If the number of people working at a business is exactly the number needed to make the business run successfully, then you can't fire people just because of a change in minimum wage. And if the number of people working at a business is more than the minimum needed, well, then that would just suggest that the business is profitable enough to accept a change in the minimum wage.
In the end, the question is one of looking at what are the costs of living versus the wages that one can earn. When I started working, the minimum wage was four times the cost of three quarts of milk - or, to put it metric - three litre jugs of milk. Today, with milk at $4.27 (or thereabouts) the minimum wage doesn't even buy you two.
Ditto everything from cars to clothes to accommodation. And that means that lots of working people in this province are just getting poorer.
Frankly, I don't think that we want to be No. 1 in the country in the lowest minimum wage category.
