Real Living Wage Increase: 500,000 Workers Set for Pay Rise Under New Rates
- New Real Living Wage rates announced, impacting 500,000 workers
- UK-wide wage rate rises to £12.60, London rate increases to £13.85
- Labour plans further wage reforms in upcoming Budget
Today, the Living Wage Foundation announced new rates for the Real Living Wage, granting 500,000 workers an increase in earnings. The Real Living Wage, which is a voluntary wage based on living costs, will rise to £12.60 per hour across the UK and £13.85 in London. This marks a significant 5% increase from last year’s figures, meaning annual gains of up to £1,365 for Londoners. Employers have until May 2025 to implement the new rates.
While the government mandates the National Living Wage, the Real Living Wage is higher and voluntary, covering workers over 18. As Labour gears up for its Budget, Deputy PM Angela Rayner hinted at further wage reforms, promising to address wage disparities and cost-of-living challenges. Major employers such as Ikea, Barclays, and Oxfam are among 15,000 businesses already signed up for the Real Living Wage.
Tom Church, Co-Founder of LatestDeals.co.uk, commented: “It’s great to see so many businesses committing to fair pay, especially in challenging economic times."
The thing with the minimum wage increasing is everyone above it expects their wage differential to be maintained so there is a general increase in wages and of course this has a huge inflationary pressure on the economy as these costs have to be passed on to their customers. So many people now are on the minimum wage or close to it. Increasing costs like this makes our products less competitive and harder to export. It's a very difficult situation but the minimum wage can make us poorer. When Labour first introduced the minimum wage we lost a huge amount of manufacturing companies who became less competitive and couldn't export, these weren't super profitable companies they were barely surviving due to the high costs of manufacturing in the UK and now we have a huge trade deficit and £180k of debt for every single person in the UK.
Many countries subsidise their manufacturing companies and provide financial guarantees to ensure they have a good manufacturing base. Volkswagen's debt is approaching £200 billion now and BMW is over £100 billion I believe and both these companies are facing huge financial issues in China which will add to their debts. We need to be much more clever how we tax manufacturing businesses. Sadly we haven't got a clue what we are doing it seems.
I was pleased to hear that the minimum wage has increased. Unfortunately it’s not due to be implemented until April next year.