{"id":89583,"date":"2022-04-01T15:49:35","date_gmt":"2022-04-01T19:49:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/?p=89583"},"modified":"2022-04-07T11:08:32","modified_gmt":"2022-04-07T15:08:32","slug":"people-deserve-a-living-wage-minimum-wage-increase-not-enough-for-decent-quality-of-life-critics-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/people-deserve-a-living-wage-minimum-wage-increase-not-enough-for-decent-quality-of-life-critics-say\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018People deserve a living wage\u2019: Minimum wage increase not enough for decent quality of life, critics say"},"content":{"rendered":"
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New Brunswick\u2019s minimum wage goes up by one dollar today, to reach $12.75 per hour. And another increase is slated for October, when the minimum wage will reach $13.75.<\/p>\n

In a video posted to social media this week, Minister of Labor Trevor Holder acknowledged that \u201cmany New Brunswick families are struggling to keep up with the cost of living, and it\u2019s getting worse.\u201d Until today, New Brunswick had the lowest minimum wage of any province or territory in Canada. Saskatchewan now holds that dubious distinction.<\/p>\n

By October, New Brunswick is slated to have the highest minimum wage in the Atlantic region, against $13.70 per hour in P.E.I., $13.35 in Nova Scotia and $13.20 in Newfoundland and Labrador, according to the\u00a0Retail Council of Canada<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a far cry from last year\u2019s widely-ridiculed five cent increase, based on changes to the Consumer Price Index. At the time,\u00a0Minister Holder said in a statement<\/a>\u00a0the policy would protect the \u201cpurchasing power of employees\u201d while ensuring \u201cpredictability for businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n

But this year\u2019s heftier raise still falls short of what anti-poverty activist call a living wage.<\/p>\n

That amount would be close to $20 per hour in New Brunswick cities, according to calculations by the Saint John-based Human Development Council. A living wage measures \u201cthe amount a household would have to earn to cover basic needs and live with dignity while enjoying a decent quality of life,\u201d according to that group\u2019s definition.<\/p>\n

Louis-Philippe Gauthier, senior director of Legislative Affairs Atlantic for the\u00a0Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses (CFIB),<\/a> called the minimum wage a \u201cblunt instrument\u201d for poverty reduction. The CFIB has argued many minimum wage earners are teenagers who live with their parents and don\u2019t rely on their wages to survive.<\/p>\n

But data from the Government of New Brunswick indicates 64 per cent of the roughly 45,000 people affected by this year\u2019s increases are more than 19 years old.<\/p>\n

And more than half of those affected are women. One local entrepreneur\u2013Madison Bragg, owner of Sackville-based Bragg\u2019s Cleaning<\/a>\u2013said she won\u2019t be affected by the change because her employees start at $15 per hour, and she believes it\u2019s unacceptable to pay any less.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel empathy for the businesses that will be affected,\u201d she said. \u201cI do think there are solutions out there because I seem to be able to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Abram Lutes, provincial coordinator for the New Brunswick Common Front for Social Justice said higher wages will ultimately result in more sales at small businesses, because people will have more money to spend.<\/p>\n

Instead, many people find themselves in \u201cdesperate conditions,\u201d he said. \u201cYou have entities like payday lenders and things like that, that prey on the fact that people are short on cash, which in the long run only perpetuates the cycle of poverty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Listen to the CHMA story below:<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New Brunswick\u2019s minimum wage goes up by one dollar today, to reach $12.75 per hour. And another increase is slated for October, when the minimum wage will reach $13.75. In a video posted to social media this week, Minister of Labor Trevor Holder acknowledged that \u201cmany New Brunswick families are struggling to keep up with…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":89589,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[217,225],"tags":[714,535,13689,824,823],"radio":[227],"origine":[274,275,277],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89583"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89583"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89583\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90208,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89583\/revisions\/90208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89583"},{"taxonomy":"radio","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/radio?post=89583"},{"taxonomy":"origine","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/origine?post=89583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}