CHANCELLOR ANNOUNCES BOOST TO PAY – BUT UNDER-25s EXCLUDED (FOR NO APPARENT REASON)
The Chancellor George Osborne has just announced the introduction of a new compulsory living wage of £7.20 per hour, which will take effect from April 2016 and rise to £9 an hour by 2020. Yet for some unspecified reason it will only be payable to workers who are aged 25 and over.
As far as we’re aware, no explanation has been given for this. It appears to be yet another example of the casual ageism towards young workers that we’ve come to expect from politicians, combined with the out-of-date assumption that young people can just live with their parents or sleep on friends’ floors indefinitely, rent-free.
Or perhaps it’s assumed those under-25 have fewer skills or less experience than older workers, simply because they’re younger?
But that doesn’t work either. A hard-working, 23-year-old could easily have more to offer than a less ambitious 25-year-old. Why should they be paid less just because they’ve had fewer birthdays?
We don’t get it. And Graduate Fog can only imagine the outrage if the Budget included an announcement that those aged over 60 were to receive a lower minimum or living wage than those under 60, for no apparent reason (We predict the Daily Mail would actually explode).
Taken together with the removal of housing benefit for those under 21, TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady agreed that the Budget was harsh on Britain’s young people, saying:
“For young people, it was all bad news as they will not get the minimum wage boost and will suffer from cuts to higher education grants and housing benefit.”
Graduate Fog is baffled by this casual ageism – and even more so by the fact that so few people seem to question it. Tell us us again, George… why is the hard work of those under 25 not worthy of a wage they can actually live on?
Presumably the same reason childless under 25s can’t get tax credits and get a lower rate of Job Seeker’s Allowance, under 21s and apprentices get a lower minimum wage and single, childless adults renting privately get a lower rate of Housing Benefit based on a room until they’re 35 (increased from 25 by the coalition).
Basically ageism against young adults is rife in employment and welfare policy.
Isn’t Osborne attacking Housing Benefit for most unemployed and low paid under 21s now too?
@Alex W
Yes I saw that too. It’s as if they’ve realised that young people an easy target. Plus there’s a sense the old argument ‘young people have always been skint’ is hanging in the air. Without any real thought to just HOW skint they are. Yes, they have no savings. But they also have huge debts, from paying for education, whether that’s student loan, or credit card debt while they’ve been at college. That’s the big difference now – but it’s completely ignored. Do you think they assume everyone under-25 can just live with their parents, rent-free, indefinitely? The wages of today’s young people are already pitiful. With so many internships being unpaid still, graduates have begun to think of the minimum wage as a decent salary – when really it isn’t at all. And the living wage is a king’s ransom – when again, it really isn’t…
Presumably the argument for paying young people a bit less is because some of them are a bit less good at their jobs, just because of their age?
If so, then the same could be said for the older end of the pay scale. Some over 60s will be less sharp than others, because they’re slowing down a bit. Should all over 60s be penalised because of this, even when they’re still doing work that’s just as good as their younger colleagues? We would never accept that, yet when it comes to young people it seems this bias against them is totally acceptable.
I think someone is either doing a job, or they aren’t. If they’re not doing it properly, employers should be able to take appropriate steps. If they are, their age is irrelevant. Everyone should be paid the same for the job they are doing, regardless of how many birthdays they’ve had.
” Do you think they assume everyone under-25 can just live with their parents, rent-free, indefinitely”
Yes I think they do. I bet IDS (whose experience of social security seems to limited to illegal claiming the dole after he left the Forces whilst living with the working daughter of a millionaire) doesn’t even know – for instance – that if a young adult moves in with a parent who is themselves on Housing Benefit, they can get some of it docked for having a non-dependent adult move in.
They – being from such rich backgrounds – probably also can’t comprehend that many young adults’ families don’t have the space to take them back – especially if the lounge of a one bed flat is already full of homeless relatives.
Also some parents simply won’t offer shelter – free or not – to adult children, and they are under no legal obligation to do so. And, of course, some families are abusive or otherwise broken.
“If so, then the same could be said for the older end of the pay scale. Some over 60s will be less sharp than others, because they’re slowing down a bit.”
Indeed.
And on the topic of the elderly, obviously some older people are fine to stay and want to stay in the workforce, but not all are, and certainly not for all types of work (e.g. very physically demanding work like being a firefighter).
But that doesn’t mean they should be working us to death by raising the state pension ever higher and higher, or sadistically forcing 62-year olds who’ve worked all their life to sign on to JSA rather than a pension in what is still a very ageist job market.
It really seems sometimes they want to do what Bismarck did with his first pension, and set it at an age the working class had generally died of old age by.
I was talking to my Mum about this earlier, and she said that maybe the reason this doesn’t extend to under-25s is so that businesses are encouraged to hire more young workers because they would cheaper.
But if they are just going to use unpaid internships and still require experience to get to these jobs, I don’t see what difference it will make.
I’m not really sure what to think about all of this as I still haven’t managed to read up on everything from the budget.
Lets not be naive…notwithstanding the introduction of a National Living Wage, or an alternative proposition is that a higher National Minimum Wage in everything but name, the intention to remove In Work Credits will require any proposed National Minimum/Living Wage to be substantially higher than that proposed.
But credit where credit is due…and Gideon Osborne is on track to become a has-been to occupy David Cameron’s seat when he retires.
Well why didn’t you “young” people get off your lazy butts and vote? Serves you right then?
I’m a bit older than 25 but if you all had bothered to vote maybe this crappy government wouldn’t have been here now dishing out its nastiness would it?
Ok some did but a heck of a lot didn’t bother – too busy on social media or hung over or some other feeble reason. This demonstrated by the amount of people leaving registering to the last minute and then failing to.
Plan more carefully and think of the consequences the lesson. New Labour conservatives admmittedly are/were crap but not quite as crap as what we’ve ended up with hey?
I remember Thatcher and she effectively ruined my potential of a good career/life as many of you guys will be the same under this lot. My advice get the education then get the hell out of here. My biggest mistake was taking ‘any’ job and that’s what my career became – any job with lots of unemployment between. Thanks Thatcher!
The government are definitely taking it for granted that all under 25s are able to be financed by their parents. Sometimes I wonder why they don’t just put the age of legal adulthood up to 25.