# Minimum wage increased 3 per cent to $740.80 a week



## Hugh G (Sep 22, 2016)

*Minimum wage increased 3 per cent to $740.80 a week*


By business reporter Stephanie Chalmers
Updated 11:15am 30/05/2019
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-05-30/minimum-wage-decision/11162780

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Photo:* The decision directly affects more than 2.2 million Australian workers. (AAP) 

Around 2.2 million Australian workers will receive a pay rise after the Fair Work Commission increased the national minimum wage by 3 per cent, amounting to an extra $21.60 a week.

The Commission's annual review decision takes the minimum wage to $740.80 a week or $19.49 an hour.

The increase is lower than the 3.5 per cent pay rise awarded by the commission last year.

The Australian Council of Trade Unions had called for a larger 6 per cent increase, or an extra $43 a week, followed by another increase next year to lift the minimum wage by $72.80 a week over two years.

"Within two years, we can make sure no full-time working Australian lives in poverty, while also stimulating spending and generating economic activity and growth," ACTU secretary Sally McManus said in March.

However, business groups called for smaller pay rises. The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry recommend the increase not exceed 1.8 per cent.

The Australian Industry Group argued for a "modest" 2 per cent, or $14.40 a week, increase, calling the previous two increases awarded by the commission "exceptionally high and out of step with overall wage movements and economic settings".

The decision comes as wage growth remains stuck around historically low levels, with the Bureau of Statistics' latest Wage Price Index showing annual wage growth of 2.3 per cent for the third quarter in a row.

In February, Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe told a parliamentary committee a 3.5 per cent increase in the minimum wage would make sense and argued stagnant household incomes were a threat to consumer spending.

"Many people borrowed assuming their incomes would grow at the old rate and they haven't," he said.

"They're having more difficulty, they've got less free cash and so they can't spend, so this is why I've put so much emphasis on the need for a pick-up in wage growth."


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## Phatboy (Feb 9, 2017)

To anybody out there..... Let me know when you get yours.........


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## Teal (Feb 7, 2018)

Won't do Jack, the employer committing wage theft today will not hand over a wage increase tomorrow.

We need the unions to wake up and fix the real problems, but they are to busy lining their Boomer members pockets to care.


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