It’s now hard to find a politician who doesn’t think the living wage is a good idea. Those companies who pay their employees at least £7.45 an hour (or £8.55 in London), report increased productivity, reduced absenteeism, improved morale and higher staff retention rates. And the government benefits too. The IFS estimates that for every £1 spent on raising pay to living wage level, around 50p returns to the Treasury in the form of reduced welfare payments and higher tax revenues.
It’s statistics like this that prompt some to ask why we shouldn’t simply raise the minimum wage (currently £6.19 an hour) to the level of its younger brother. It’s an option that all party leaders, including Ed Miliband, have so far rejected but what do the voters think? Labour List has just published a new Survation poll (carried out as part of the Unions21 Fair Work Commission) of 1,004 employed people showing that 60 per cent support a compulsory living wage – even if it costs jobs. Asked whether the government should “increase the minimum wage to ensure everyone earns enough to meet reasonable living costs, even if this results in job losses”, 71 per cent of Labour voters, 66 per cent of Lib Dems and 44 per cent of Conservatives say yes. There is, as Mark Ferguson notes, majority support for the move across all regions of the UK and all classes.
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